APR    1  1912 


929.1 


OTHER  SHEEP 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR      ^ 

SOlIfeS  IN  ACTION.  The  Crucible  of  the 
New  Life.  Expanding  the  narrative  of 
Twice-Born  Men. 

Cases  of  conversion  in  which  the  dynamic  change  was 
'  completed  through  struggle  on  the  part  of  the  individual, 
a  progressive  struggle  of  the  will  even  after  the  heart  had 
been  persuaded. 

i2mo.  Net,  $1.25 

THE  CAGE.    A  Novel  of  Marriage. 

The  theme  of  this  book  is  that  "  social  questions  are 
difficult  and  dangerous  while  the  one  central  and  eternal 
question  of  life,  Whither  goest  thou  ?  remains  unan- 
swered." 

i2mo.  Net,  $1.20 

THE  CHALLENGE.  A  Novel  of  Two  Con- 
tinents. 

This  records  the  struggle  between  two  ideals.  In  India 
Mr.  Begbie  has  discovered  a  new  and  stimulating  atmos- 
phere for  his  genius  —  the  vein  of  romance  which  gives 
the  uplift  to  all  reality. 

I2mo.  Net,  $1.20 


/. 


OTHER  SHEEP 


A   MISSIONARY   COMPANION 
TO  "TWICE-BORN  MEN" 


"Other  sheep  I  have  zvhich  are  not  of  this  fold,** — John  x:  16 


HAROLD  BEGBIE 

Author  of  "SOULS  IN  ACTION" 


y^S  Or  riMh 
APR    1  IS 

^!7fCAL  %^ 


h 


HODDER  &  STOUGHTON 

NEW  YORK 

GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1912, 
By  George  H.  Doran  Company 


PREFACE 

''  Ask  of  Me,  and  I  shall  give  thee  the  heathen  for  thine 
inheritance." 

Beyond  the  narrow  boundaries  of  Europe  extends  a  vast 
territory  thick-sown  with  a  various  population  of  heathen 
humanity.  The  pulse  of  civilization,  throbbing  so  furi- 
ously in  the  West,  seems  over  this  enormous  area  scarcely 
to  beat  at  all.  It  is  as  if  evolution  had  circumscribed  its 
energies  to  the  coasts  of  Christendom,  as  if  humanity  had 
chosen  Europe  for  its  line  of  march  and  made  Asia  its 
perpetual  camp  of  rest,  as  if  the  West  represented  the 
creative  week-days  of  mankind  and  the  East  its  everlast- 
ing sabbath. 

In  Europe,  amid  the  roar  of  wheels  and  in  the  glare  of 
the  furnace,  science  seeks  for  truth,  the  politician  labours 
for  millennium,  religion  preaches  struggle,  and  humanity 
wrestles  for  a  destiny.  In  Asia,  where  sleep  and  silence 
brood  upon  the  pensive  earth,  science  sits  with  folded 
hands,  the  politician  has  yet  hardly  opened  his  eyes,  an 
immemorial  religion  whispers  to  the  soul  to  surrender, 
and  humanity  dreams  of  nothing  but  annihilation  for  its 
final  good.  The  stream  of  existence  floods  through  Eu- 
rope turbulent  and  foaming  to  the  invisible  ocean  of  eter- 
nity; in  Asia  the  waters  of  life  are  like  a  stagnant  fen. 

Whether  Europe  has  any  responsibility  towards  Asia, 
or  whether  Christianity  owes  any  duty  to  heathendom, 
East  and  West  have  met  and  the  hemispheres  of  ge- 


VI 


PREFACE 


ography  and  the  zones  of  the  whole  earth  have  become  the 
one  world  of  man.  This,  for  good  or  for  evil,  is  accom- 
plished; and  though  the  stream  of  European  civilization 
has  only  begun  to  stir  the  marge  of  Asian  stagnation, 
nevertheless  the  two  waters  have  actually  touched,  are 
now  inevitably  destined  to  commingle,  and  either  Europe 
must  be  swamped  and  overwhelmed  by  Asia  or  Asia 
swept  forward  concurrently  with  Europe  by  the  same 
impulse  of  progress,  the  same  impulse  of  faith  in  ulti- 
mate perfection. 

Awakening  Asia  is  the  new  planet  in  the  political  skies. 
And  the  supreme  question  for  civilization  is  whether  she 
wake  to  the  moral  restraints  and  sanctifying  respects  of 
the  Christian  religion,  or  to  the  logical  nihilism  of  an 
honest  materialism. 

There  is  a  foolish  notion  abroad  that  Christianity  — 
Eastern  in  its  origin  —  is  the  religion  best  fitted  for  the 
West,  and  Hinduism  —  an  idolatrous  superstition  sur- 
viving from  the  dark  night  of  paganism  —  the  religion 
best  fitted  for  an  awakening  India.  Those  who  cherish 
this  notion  not  only  ignore  the  consideration  that  if  Chris- 
tianity be  true  it  is  true  for  all  mankind,  but  would  have 
us  think  that  an  Orient  waking  to  the  knowledge  and 
culture  of  the  Occident  will  still  satisfy  its  soul  with  the 
myth  of  its  own  departed  darkness.  Far  from  this  folly, 
is  the  truth  of  things;  and  nothing  could  be  more  fatal 
to  civilization  than  to  let  a  loose  prejudice  against  mis- 
sionaries blind  the  eyes  of  Europe  to  this  certain  truth, 
that  Awakening  Asia  will  either  rise  up  in  the  faith  of 
Christianity  or  in  the  no-faith  of  a  truculent  materialism. 

Materialism  in  England  is  saturated  through  and 
through  with  the  ethical  ideas  of  Jesus;  our  intellectual 


PREFACE  vii 

agnosticism  is  moral  with  the  inexpungable  leaven  of 
Christianity.  But  in  such  a  country  as  India,  men  who 
grow  out  of  the  superstitions  of  their  ancestors,  stand 
empty-souled  in  the  midst  of  the  universe  and  have  noth- 
ing in  their  minds  but  the  impulse  of  struggle  for  exist- 
ence. Unless  this  growth  out  of  superstition  be  accom- 
panied by  a  growth  in  Christianity,  calamity  beyond  the 
wit  of  man  to  imagine  must  eventually  overtake  the  hu- 
man race.  Let  these  dense  millions  once  believe  that 
morality  is  a  social  contrivance,  that  spiritual  respon- 
sibility is  a  mere  invention  of  the  priest,  that  life  has 
no  immortal  significance  for  the  individual,  that  existence 
here  is  nothing  more  serious  or  complex  than  a  struggle 
to  gratify  the  sensual  appetites;  let  this  perfectly  logical 
inference  from  the  dogmas  of  materialism  once  be  drawn 
by  the  cunning  and  inquisitive  mind  of  the  East,  and  at 
once  earth  would  witness  that  frightful  spectacle  of 
which  the  virtuous  man  stands  most  in  dread  —  the  hu- 
man race  organizing  itself  for  evil. 

In  contrast  to  this  threatening  night  of  anarchy,  is 
the  bright  dawn  that  awaits  the  whole  earth  in  an  East 
risen  to  the  call  of  Christ.  And  no  one  who  has  discussed 
religion  with  the  peoples  of  India  can  hesitate  a  single 
moment  to  believe  that  Christ  is  as  able  to  call  the  East 
as  He  is  able  to  save  and  maintain  the  West.  I  do  not 
defend  all  missionaries  of  the  Christian  religion,  and  as 
this  book  will  show,  I  disapprove  profoundly  of  many 
methods  hitherto  employed  to  convert  the  peoples  of  In- 
dia; but  my  reason  is  convinced  that  the  true  religion 
revealed  by  Jesus  in  the  East  is  a  religion  not  only 
"  suitable  "  to  India,  and  not  only  the  one  religion  which 
can  elevate  the  millions  of  India,  but  that  those  millions 


viii  PREFACE 

are  both  ready  and  eager  to  embrace  the  faith  of  Christ 
when  it  is  presented  to  them  in  the  spirit  of  its  founder. 
In  India,  as  still  in  Europe, 

The  hungry  sheep  look  up  and  are  not  fed; 

but  everywhere  there  are  signs  that  the  Little  Flock  is 
enlarging  its  fold,  that  the  Other  Sheep  are  being  called, 
and  that  Christ  will  yet  draw  All  Men  unto  Him.  The 
pages  which  follow  demonstrate  the  truth  of  this  asser- 
tion. 

It  is  as  well  perhaps  that  I  should  begin  by  offer- 
ing a  propitiatory  sacrifice  to  those  stern  and  minatory 
guardians  of  the  Public  Intellect  who,  not  without  good 
reason,  clap  damnation  on  any  book  of  foreign  travel 
which  seems  to  them  shot  from  the  press  with  the  imprint 
of  a  return-ticket  visible  and  offensive  on  its  title  page. 
And  I  cannot  better  placate  these  critics,  nor  more  ef- 
fectually get  the  interest  and  curiosity  of  my  readers, 
than  by  furnishing  an  account  of  the  strange  and  roman- 
tic person  in  whose  company  I  made  most  of  my  jour- 
neys and  whose  matchless  knowledge  of  the  peoples  of 
India  was  laid  frankly  and  unsparingly  open  to  me  by  the 
generous  hand  of  affectionate  friendship. 

It  is  not  the  length  of  time  he  spends  in  a  country,  but 
rather  the  people  he  meets  and  the  sympathy  he  brings 
to  an  understanding  of  the  new  environment,  which  most 
help  the  inquiring  traveller  to  form  a  right  judgment  and 
best  enable  him  to  present  a  faithful  account  of  his  ex- 
ploration. 

My  credentials  are  the  gentleman  whom  I  now  present 
to  my  readers  under  his  Indian  name  of  Fakir  Singh. 
No  one,  I  believe,  is  better  acquainted  with  the  mind  and 


PREFACE  ix 

soul  of  India;  no  one  has  ever  penetrated  further  into 
the  holy  of  holies  of  her  immemorial  solitude  and  seclu- 
sion; no  one  can  pretend  to  a  knowledge  anything  like 
so  intimate  and  sympathetic  of  her  inner  life,  her  human 
heart,  and  her  troubled  soul.  When  he  is  describing  the 
peoples  of  India,  one  exclaims  — '*  ce  n'est  plus  la  repre- 
sentation de  la  vie,  c'est  la  vie  meme,  la  vie  humaine  palpi- 
tante  et  f  remissante,  et  non  pas  seulement  la  vie  exterieure, 
mais  la  vie  interieure,  la  vie  mysterieuse  de  Tame."  For 
he  is  neither  a  blundering  theosophist  shut  up  in  a  tovi^er 
v^ith  a  few  Indian  philosophers  as  ignorant  of  Sanskrit  as 
of  physical  science,  nor  yet  a  British  Official  pestered  out 
of  his  life  by  incessant  correspondence  and  fenced  about 
by  the  necessary  pomp  and  circumstance  of  his  position; 
far  from  all  this,  he  is  an  amiable  scholar,  a  curious  in- 
quirer, and  a  gentle,  earnest  Christian,  wandering  into  the 
villages  and  homes  of  the  peoples,  sitting  under  their 
trees  with  them,  sharing  their  simple  food,  speaking  their 
languages  like  one  of  themselves,  observing  their  cus- 
toms as  naturally  as  if  he  had  been  born  into  them,  and 
drawing  from  them  their  fullest  confidence  and  their  en- 
tire faith  by  means  of  a  sympathy  only  perfect  because 
it  is  spiritually  and  intellectually  sincere. 

This  unique  person,  then,  is  at  once  the  inspiration 
and  warrant  of  my  book.  To  make  his  acquaintance 
was  one  of  the  chief  enthusiasms  with  which  I  journeyed 
Eastwards  to  discover  the  place  of  Christianity  in  India; 
and,  although  I  do  not  agree  with  all  he  has  to  say,  and 
although  I  gained  from  other  men,  such  as  Sir  George 
Clarke,  Sir  John  Hewett,  and  Sir  Louis  Dane,  much 
striking  and  useful  information,  and  although  many  of 
the  opinions  I  express  in  this  book  may  give  even  pain  to 


X  PREFACE 

the  amiable  Fakir,  still,  gratefully  do  I  acknowledge  that 
it  is  this  extraordinary  man  who  brought  me  nearest 
to  the  heart  of  India  and  who  seems  to  me  now  the  fittest 
propitiation  that  I  can  offer  at  the  altar  of  judgment. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Fakir  Singh i 

The  Children  of  India 15 

The  Temple  of  Terror 40 

Two  Pandals 59 

The  Devil-Dancer "j^j 

The  Witch 88 

Devil-Priests 99 

Respectable  Hinduism 127 

The  Laundry  of  Souls 135 

The  Collision 155 

What  It  Costs 181 

De  Profundis 198 

Buddha-Land 214 

Restoration 242 

The  Bhils 253 

The  Doms 274 

The  Bhatus  and  a  Brigadier     .......  303 

The  Haburas  and  a  Chokidah 319 

The  Lion  in  the  Way 328 

The  New  Birth 342 

Notes 349 

xi 


FAKIR  SINGH 

There  is  no  man  living,  perhaps,  whose  career  bears 
so  strong  a  resemblance  to  the  history  of  Don  Quixote 
as  the  turbaned  and  dhotied  Englishman  in  India  known 
as  Fakir  Singh.  And  it  is  no  mere  caprice  of  fancy 
w^hich  sees  in  his  long,  lean,  and  cadaverous  counte- 
nance, with  its  strained  expression  of  the  dreamer  and  its 
dignified  note  of  spiritual  austerity,  a  likeness,  a  remark- 
able and  compelling  likeness,  to  the  great  gentleman  of 
La  Mancha. 

Fakir  Singh,  till  middle  life,  was  a  Mr.  Tucker,  of 
the  Indian  Civil  Service.  Born  of  pious  parents,  he 
grew  up  in  the  atmosphere  of  Victorian  Evangelicalism, 
and  like  so  many  members  of  the  Civil  Service  in  those 
days,  gave  up  the  time  of  his  leisure  to  promoting  a 
knowledge  of  Christianity  among  the  natives  of  his  dis- 
trict. He  was  a  great  Sahib  administering  justice,  faith- 
fully performing  the  duties  of  his  office,  and  teaching  the 
heathen  from  his  place  of  overlord  the  story  of  Christ 
and  the  discipline  of  the  Church. 

Just  as  the  reading  of  many  books  on  chivalry  turned 
the  brain  of  Don  Quixote  and  made  him  a  knight-errant 
as  nearly  Christlike  as  any  figure  in  the  field  of  art,  so 
the  reading  of  many  treatises  and  tracts  on  religion 
worked  upon  the  heart  and  soul  of  our  Indian  Civil  Serv- 
ant till  he  abandoned  the  common  ways  of  life  and  be- 
came at  last,  as  romantic  a  knight-errant  of  Christianity 

I 


2  OTHER  SHEEP 

as  ever  begged  his  bread  and  slept  under  the  stars.  A 
single  sermon  in  a  journal  published  by  the  Salvation 
Army  in  London  was  this  good  gentleman's  culminating 
Feliciano  de  Silva.  "  Here  is  the  true  light !  "  he  ex- 
claimed, and  with  new  joy  in  his  heart  set  himself  to 
read  the  little  newspaper  from  beginning  to  end. 

Instead  of  discussions  on  dogma,  instead  of  painful 
exegesis  and  mournful  lamentations  on  the  faithlessness 
of  that  generation,  in  this  humble  journal  he  found  story 
after  story  of  triumph  and  conquest  —  narrations  of 
souls  rescued  from  the  edge  of  ruin  and  spirits  dragged 
from  perdition  by  the  hands  of  rejoicing  faith.  It  was 
like  a  trumpet  to  his  soul.  Straightway  he  applied  for 
leave,  set  sail  for  England,  and  attended  the  first  pos- 
sible meeting  of  the  Salvation  Army,  at  which  General 
Booth  was  speaking. 

The  eloquence  of  the  old  General,  and  the  magnetism 
of  that  remarkable  personality,  fired  him  to  the  pitch 
of  enthusiasm.  The  call  for  self-sacrifice  was  like  a 
music  in  his  heart.  The  thought  of  battle  against  sin, 
sorrow,  and  ignorance  worked  like  a  madness  in  his 
brain.  He  presented  himself  before  General  Booth  after 
the  meeting  and  stated  his  desire  to  become  a  Salvationist. 
He  was  asked  to  call  at  the  Headquarters  of  the  Sal- 
vation Army  on  the  following  day.  He  found  himself 
cautiously  received.  The  General  hesitated  to  accept 
the  sacrifice.  In  a  few  years'  time  the  volunteer,  a 
rather  fine-looking  gentleman,  would  be  entitled  to  his 
pension.  Surely  it  was  better  to  wait  —  better  that  he 
should  help  the  Salvation  Army  as  a  friend  and  see 
when  the  day  came  for  retirement  whether  he  was  still 
willing  to  bear  the  hard  life  and  unyielding  discipline  of 


FAKIR  SINGH  3 

a  soldier.  This  consideration  had  to  be  weighed.  But 
not  for  long.  The  volunteer  called  again.  ''  I  have  re- 
tired from  the  Civil  Service,"  he  announced ;  "  I  am  now 
penniless;  you  must  take  me;  there  is  no  one  else  to 
whom  I  can  go." 

To  win  India  for  Christianity  was  the  master- 
thought  of  this  Fakir  who  had  sacrificed  place  and  pen- 
sion for  his  religion.  And  with  this  master-thought 
there  beat  upon  his  brain  the  saying  of  Keshab  Chandar 
Sen,  founder  of  the  Brahmo  Samaj,  that  never  would 
India  surrender  to  Christ  so>  long  as  the  Saviour  of  the 
white  races  appeared  before  her  peoples  in  European 
dress. 

The  wise  and  statesmanlike  views  of  General  Booth 
harmonized  with  the  convictions  of  the  Fakir.  India, 
if  she  wanted  the  Salvation  Army,  must  pay  for  the 
Salvation  Army.  No  mission  could  be  considered  safe 
which  depended  upon  foreign  countries  for  its  support. 
Anything  in  the  nature  of  buying  converts  was  to  be 
avoided.  India  must  be  taught  to  feel  that  Christianity 
was  a  blessing  passionately  to  be  sought  and  gratefully 
to  be  received,  something  for  which  they  must  be  ready 
to  make  sacrifices  and  endure  persecution.  The  neces- 
sity for  self-support  was  the  first  and  chief  consideration ; 
and  this  consideration  led  to  the  decision,  that  whatever 
system  was  introduced  it  must  be  sufficiently  inexpensive 
to  succeed  among  the  poor  and  humble  classes  of  In- 
dia. 

Accordingly,  the  Fakir  decided,  with  the  blessing  of 
his  General,  to  adopt  the  native  dress,  to  follow  native 
customs,  and  in  everything  to  bring  the  mission  of  the 
Salvation  Army  into  as  close  a  correspondence  with  the 


4  •     OTHER  SHEEP 

traditions,  habits,  and  manners  of  India  as  the  nature  of 
Christianity  would  allow. 

At  first  official  India  was  filled  with  consternation  at 
the  news  of  an  invasion  by  the  Salvationists.  The  Fakir 
had  scarce  landed  in  Bombay  before  he  was  arrested  and 
cast  into  prison.  It  was  held  that  the  methods  of  the 
Salvation  Army  would  imperil  the  prestige  of  the  rul- 
ing race,  that  its  bands  and  street-corner  preaching  would 
lead  to  riots  among  the  conflicting  peoples  of  the  Em- 
pire. Men  in  high  office,  who  are  now  the  friends  and 
warm  admirers  of  the  Fakir,  looked  with  genuine  horror 
and  alarm  at  this  new  disturbance  of  India's  difficult 
peace. 

But  when  the  first  storm  had  abated,  our  Don  Quixote 
set  out  alone  on  a  journey  of  exploration,  to  judge  how 
best  the  mission  of  the  Salvation  Army  might  be  set  in 
motion  for  the  good  and  blessing  of  India.  "  I  had  in 
my  soul,"  he  told  me,  "  a  desperate  determination  to 
break  down  at  any  and  every  cost  all  barriers  that  divided 
us  from  the  peoples  of  India/' 

His  equipment  was  meagre.  Clothed  in  turban  and 
dhoti,  with  a  sack  for  his  bedding  and  a  small  tin  box 
for  his  papers,  he  set  out  barefoot  and  unaccompanied  on 
a  journey  as  romantic  and  critical  as  anything  adventured 
by  the  Knight  of  the  Rueful  Countenance.  He  is  well 
acquainted  with  Indian  customs,  he  speaks  most  of  the 
languages  and  dialects,  and  he  has  to  perfection  that  ex- 
quisite sense  of  courtesy  and  thoughtfulness  which  alone 
can  ensure  the  European  from  giving  ofTence  to  the  al- 
ways suspicious  and  self-conscious  native  mind.  But 
how  great  the  plunge  and  how  hazardous  the  venture! 
He  was  a  Sahib  and  the  son  of  a  Sahib.     Such  a  Sahib 


FAKIR  SINGH  5 

wandering  about  the  country  barefoot  and  in  native  dress, 
begging  his  curry  and  rice  at  the  door  of  the  peasants, 
sleeping  under  the  shade  of  village  trees,  and  speaking 
of  Christ  and  the  new  life  of  conversion  to  the  water- 
drawers  at  the  well  and  the  reapers  in  the  rice-field,  might 
indeed  provoke  curiosity  and  attract  the  multitude;  but 
what  privation  and  discomfort  he  must  endure,  what  risks 
of  disease  and  death  he  must  encounter,  and  what  opposi- 
tion, ridicule,  and  contempt  he  must  expect  from  the  peo- 
ple of  his  own  race  and  traditions.  Nevertheless,  he  "  had 
in  his  soul  that  desperate  determination  to  break  down  at 
any  and  every  cost  all  barriers  that  divide  us  from  the  peo- 
ples of  India  " ;  and  he  was  fired  and  exhilarated  by  the 
thought  that  at  last  Christ  should  appear  before  Easterns 
as  an  Eastern,  and  the  religion  of  Christ  reach  to  their 
souls  not  as  an  alien  patronage  of  the  ruling  race,  but  as 
a  liberation  and  a  blessing  from  God. 

One  of  the  first  places  he  visited  was  Naini  Tal,  and 
scarcely  had  he  got  to  the  Indian  Dharamsala,  or  rest- 
house,  before  a  policeman  appeared  with  a  warrant  for 
his  arrest.  He  was  taken  before  the  young  magistrate 
who  had  issued  the  order,  probably  as  a  jest,  and  after 
answering  a  few  questions  was  set  at  liberty.  The 
superior  officer  of  the  young  magistrate,  who  was  a  sin- 
cere Christian,  hearing  of  this  arrest  became  very  indig- 
nant, severely  reprimanded  his  subordinate,  and  sent  the 
Fakir  a  donation  of  three  hundred  rupees.  Thus  har- 
ried and  thus  encouraged,  the  barefoot  missionary  passed 
to  Almorah,  where  his  fame  had  preceded  him,  and 
where  he  found  himself  honourably  welcomed  by  the 
Sadr  Amin,  one  of  the  leading  Hindus  of  the  place,  who 
begged  him  to  be  his  guest.     The  Fakir  acknowledged 


6  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  graciousness  of  the  invitation,  but  reminded  the 
Hindu  that  he  was  of  such  a  high  caste  that  the  low 
caste  people  of  the  place  would  not  be  able  to  approach 
the  Fakir  did  he  accept  the  great  man's  hospitality. 
But  to  this  the  Sadr  Amin  replied : — 

Zat  pat  puchhe  nako 

Jo  Har  Ko  bhaje,  so  Har  Ka  ho; 

which  being  interpreted  means,  "  Let  no  one  ask  his 
caste;  he  who  worships  God  belongs  to  God."  So  the 
invitation  was  accepted.  People  thronged  to  the  house, 
questions  were  asked  and  answered,  the  religion  of 
Christ  was  presented  in  its  supremest  aspect  as  liberation 
from  sin,  and  perhaps  for  the  first  time  in  that  place  the 
animosities  and  antipathies  both  of  religion  and  race 
were  entirely  forgotten  in  the  unifying  apprehension  of 
a  universal  God.  For  the  return  journey  to  Naini  Tal, 
the  Sadr  Amin  insisted  upon  lending  the  Fakir  a  pony, 
and  not  only  rode  the  whole  way  at  his  side,  but  acted 
as  his  host  when  the  town  was  reached.  Moreover, 
hearing  that  at  an  English  meeting  a  hundred  and  one 
rupees  had  been  subscribed  for  the  Salvation  Army,  he 
said :  "  We,  too,  must  have  a  meeting  in  my  house,  and 
we  also  will  have  a  collection."  His  joy  was  excessive 
when  he  found  that  the  gifts  of  the  thronging  crowd  in 
his  house  surpassed  the  subscription  of  the  English  meet- 
ing by  two  rupees. 

Years  afterwards  General  Booth  was  in  Calcutta,  and 
a  leading  English  official  mentioned  to  him  a  conversa- 
tion he  had  had  with  the  Sadr  Amin  soon  after  this  visit 
of  the  Fakir.  *'  Sadr  Amin  Sahib,"  he  said,  "  you  have 
always  been  regarded  as  a  staunch  Hindu,  and  as  one 


FAKIR  SINGH  7 

having  no  sympathy  with  Christianity;  how  is  it,  then, 
that  you  received  this  Salvationist  into  your  house  and 
even  presided  for  him  at  his  meeting?  "  "  Sahib,"  was 
the  reply,  "  had  I  seen  Christianity  such  as  this  before,  I 
should  myself  have  been  a  Christian." 

At  Batala,  one  of  his  next  stopping-places,  our  Fakir 
was  accosted  by  a  Hindu  in  the  streets  who  asked  him 
to  what  religion  he  belonged.  "  To  the  Jiwan-Mukti 
Pant  —  the  Get-Saved- While-You-Are- Alive  religion," 
was  the  good-natured  reply.  "  Where  are  you  going  to 
get  food  ? "  asked  the  Hindu.  "  God  will  provide," 
answered  the  Fakir.  "  Come  to  my  house ;  honour  me 
by  coming,"  said  the  Hindu  eagerly.  The  Fakir  raised 
the  same  objection  as  in  Almorah.  "  But  my  house  shall 
be  open  to  all,  none  shall  be  turned  away,"  replied  the 
high-caste  Hindu,  and  the  invitation  being  accepted  he 
proved  as  good  as  his  word.  The  house  was  soon  packed 
to  the  doors  and  beyond.  The  people  watched  the  Sahib 
eating  his  meal  with  his  fingers  from  the  plantain  leaf  on 
which  it  was  served;  and  when  the  necessary  mouth- 
w^ashing  and  finger-washing  were  concluded,  they  asked 
for  some  "  Gyan,"  or  religious  instruction. 

The  people  listened  with  intense  interest.  There,  like 
one  of  themselves,  sat  the  white  Fakir  who  had  eaten 
after  their  custom,  who  wore  their  dress,  and  who  spoke 
their  language  eloquently  and  without  check.  He 
brought  no  charge  against  their  own  religion,  he  made 
no  mock  of  their  gods  and  goddesses,  he  expressed  no 
anger  against  their  priests.  But  with  his  pale  face  full 
of  a  solemn  earnestness,  his  strained  eyes  shining  with 
enthusiasm  for  his  Christ,  he  told  of  a  religion  so  exactly 
fitted  to  their  needs,  so  entirely  and  wonderfully  Eastern 


8  OTHER  SHEEP 

in  its  spirit,  that  they  marvelled  to  think  it  was  Christi- 
anity—  the  religion  of  the  demons  who  take  life  and 
eat  the  flesh  of  pigs.^ 

The  heart  of  all  Indian  religions  is  the  desire  for 
Liberation.  Persuaded  by  an  immemorial  pessimism 
that  existence  is  always  accompanied  by  pain,  they  listen 
eagerly  to  the  Brahman  or  the  Buddhist  who  teaches 
them  how  to  escape  from  the  curse  of  life.  It  is  this 
inherited  and  unalterable  conviction  of  the  Eastern  mind 
which  the  Fakir  first  seized  upon  and  has  ever  after- 
wards used  for  bringing  home  to  the  heart  and  brain  of 
India  the  religion  of  Christ.  The  word  Salvation  be- 
comes with  him  the  Indian  word  for  Liberation.  The 
religion  of  Christ  is  presented  as  a  Liberation,  and  not 
as  a  Liberation  from  an  existence  incurably  bad,  but 
from  the  sins  and  ignorances  which  make  that  existence 
seem  incurably  bad.  It  is  not  a  Liberation  from  life, 
but  a  Liberation  from  despair,  death,  and  something 
worse;  it  is  not  a  Liberation  into  annihilation,  but  a 
Liberation  into  everlasting  joy  and  felicity;  and,  more- 
over, it  is  not  a  Liberation  painfully  to  be  earned  beyond 
the  grave,  but  a  Liberation  gratefully  and  joyfully  to  be 
experienced  in  the  present  world.  It  is  as  Life,  and  as 
Life  More  Abundantly,  that  the  white  Fakir  insists  upon 
the  Liberation  of  Christianity. 

In  this  manner  he  was  speaking  to  the  great  crowd 
in  the  Hindu's  house  at  Batala,  when  voices  were  sud- 
denly heard  at  the  door  and  the  place  became  invaded  by 
a  body  of  native  Christians  from  a  neighbouring  Mis- 
sion. They  had  heard  of  the  Fakir's  arrival,  and  had 
come  with  a  request  that  he  would  visit  them.     As  chance 

1  Europeans  are  widely  known  among  Indians  as  "  demons." 


FAKIR  SINGH  9 

would  have  it,  an  aunt  of  the  Fakir  was  working  in  this 
Mission,  the  Miss  Tucker  known  to  readers  of  that  gen- 
eration as  "  A.  L.  O.  E."  It  was  difficult,  therefore,  for 
the  solitary  to  refuse  the  invitation.  But  before  set- 
ting out  for  the  Mission,  he  retired  to  the  shade  of  a 
tree  and  there  held  converse  with  some  hundreds  of 
Hindus  and  Muhamadans,  while  his  former  friends 
hurried  to  the  bazaar  and  returned  with  sweetmeats  and 
milk  for  his  refreshment.  When  he  did  set  out  in  the 
evening  for  the  Mission,  it  was  in  the  company  of  over 
two  hundred  Indians  who  went  with  him  all  the  way,  a 
mile  beyond  the  city  walls,  and  remained  for  a  meeting 
which  astonished  and  delighted  the  heart  of  the  orthodox 
Miss  Tucker. 

Thus  cheered  and  encouraged,  our  traveller  journeyed 
to  Amritsar,  the  holy  city  of  the  Sikhs.  "  It  was  dark 
when  I  left  the  train,"  he  told  me.  "  I  walked  through 
the  Hall  Darwaza,  or  gateway  of  the  city,  which  was 
named  after  Colonel  Hall,  my  official  superior  when  I 
was  first  appointed  to  Amritsar  as  a  young  civilian.  I 
had  not  proceeded  far  when  a  Sikh  soldier,  who  had  been 
a  fellow-passenger  in  the  train,  came  running  after  me 
and  inquired  where  I  intended  to  pass  the  night. 
*  Under  some  tree,'  I  told  him ;  '  I  am  even  now  search- 
ing for  such  a  place.'  *  There  is  no  need  for  that,'  said 
the  soldier ;  '  I  have  a  friend  at  the  Golden  Temple,  one 
of  the  priests;  gladly  he  will  receive  you.'  I  was  de- 
lighted at  the  idea  of  sleeping  in  the  shadow  of  the 
Golden  Temple,  and  cheerfully  accepted  the  soldier's  in- 
vitation. The  priest  received  us  very  cordially,  and 
insisted  upon  my  having  a  charpoy,  or  string-bed,  for  the 
night,  though  I  assured  him  that  the  floor  would  do  quite 


lo  OTHER  SHEEP 

well.  A  Muhamadan  merchant,  who  had  known  me 
ten  years  before,  when  I  was  an  Assistant-Commissioner 
in  the  station,  had  joined,  us  on  the  way,  and  now  went 
off  to  the  bazaar  and  brought  some  milk  plentifully  sweet- 
ened with  sugar.  As  he  carried  it  with  his  own  hands 
through  the  streets,  his  tears  dropped  into  it;  and  he 
afterwards  told  me  with  what  deep  emotion  he  watched 
me  raise  to  my  lips  the  drink  watered  by  the  tears  of  his 
soul.  On  the  following  morning  a  space  was  cleared 
for  me  in  one  of  the  large  rooms  where  the  Granth  Sahib, 
or  sacred  book  of  the  Sikhs,  was  usually  read.  This 
was  not  in  the  main  temple,  but  in  one  of  the  side  build- 
ings attached  to  it,  near  the  priest's  quarters  where  I  had 
been  accommodated  for  the  night.  It  was  a  Sunday 
morning.  You  may  imagine  my  feelings  as  I  addressed 
an  audience  of  Sikhs  in  the  name  of  Christ  at  the  very 
heart  and  centre  of  the  Sikh  religion.  Towards  noon  a 
carriage  drew  up,  and  Babu  Rallia  Ram,  a  Christian  law- 
yer whom  I  had  known  well  in  the  past,  appeared  to 
claim  me  as  his  guest.  My  Sikh  hosts,  however,  were 
unwilling  to  surrender  me,  and  they  only  agreed  that  I 
should  go  for  two  hours  on  a  visit  to  my  friend  and  his 
family,  on  condition  that  I  returned  and  held  a  meeting 
in  the  Guru  ka  bagh,  the  garden  attached  to  the  temple. 
I  went  away  with  my  friend,  who  was  astonished  to  find 
me  in  the  Golden  Temple,  and  returned  to  the  Sikhs 
according  to  my  word.  There  were  several  hundreds 
waiting  for  me,  and  a  move  was  made  to  displace  one  of 
the  priests  from  his  low  pulpit  where  he  was  reading  the 
Granth  Sahib.  I  saw  that  it  would  hurt  his  feelings  to 
be  supplanted,  and  asked  whether  another  place  could  not 
be  found.     I  was  conducted  to  an  empty  talao  or  tank, 


FAKIR  SINGH  ii 

the  steps  of  which  made  an  excellent  auditorium,  and 
there  we  held  a  most  interesting  meeting.  Never  be- 
fore, and  never  since,  I  believe,  has  a  Christian  been 
allowed  this  privilege.  The  romance  of  it  must  strike 
the  dullest.  The  significance  of  it  should  surely  in- 
fluence the  wise.  This  one  incident  furnishes,  I  am  sure, 
justification,  if  justification  is  necessary,  for  our  adop- 
tion of  Indian  costume  and  methods.  Here  was  the 
Salvation  Army  installed  in  the  very  heart  and  head- 
quarters of  Sikhism,  not  only  as  an  honoured  guest,  but 
as  a  teacher  of  religion.  When  that  evening  I  knelt  in 
prayer  at  the  priest's  quarters  there  were  others  who 
knelt  with  me  and  accepted  the  Way,  the  Truth,  and  the 
Life.  What  became  of  them,  or  whether  they  remained 
faithful,  I  do  not  know ;  but  round  Amritsar  and  Batala 
at  the  present  day  we  have  some  of  our  most  successful 
and  encouraging  work.  Our  followers  there  are  cer- 
tainly numbered  by  thousands." 

It  was  never  intended,  he  tells  me,  that  the  fakir  sys- 
tem should  be  generally  adopted,  but  it  was  necessary  to 
cross  the  dividing  line  and  discover  the  best  way  of  reach- 
ing the  heart  of  India.  Not  all  the  officers  of  the  Sal- 
vation Army,  but  many  of  them  in  those  pioneer  days 
begged  their  food,  slept  in  the  open  air,  and  trusted  to 
the  hospitality  of  the  people  for  their  daily  bread.  I 
have  talked  with  several  of  these  people,  men  and  women, 
and  they  one  and  all  speak  with  delight  of  those  hard  and 
difficult  days  of  pioneering.  Some  of  these  people,  par- 
ticularly the  women,  made  a  profound  impression  upon 
me,  and  one  was  touched  by  their  almost  passionate  love 
for  the  Indian  peoples,  against  whom  they  never  speak  a 
word  of  harm.     The  work  done  by  some  of  them,  per- 


12  OTHER  SHEEP 

haps,  exceeds  the  accomplishment  of  Fakir  Singh,  and 
it  would  be  one  of  the  most  romantic  books  in  the  world 
that  told  their  story  in  the  full.^  But  they  are  content 
to  toil,  nameless  and  very  often  solitary,  and  the  one 
earthly  reward  they  seek  is  the  love  and  confidence  of 
the  childlike  peoples  of  India.  In  this  way  a  close  inti- 
macy has  been  established  by  all  of  them  with  the  various 
races;  and  in  the  case  of  Fakir  Singh  a  knowledge  of  the 
people,  always  remarkable  and  profound,  has  become 
probably  as  absolute  and  unique  as  is  possible  to  any 
European  mind. 

These  brief  details  from  the  romantic  life  of  Fakir 
Singh  at  the  beginning  of  his  great  adventure,  will,  I 
hope,  persuade  the  reader  that  I  have  enjoyed  unusual 
opportunities  for  penetrating  behind  the  veil  of  Indian 
mystery.  For  I  have  travelled  from  one  end  of  India 
to  the  other  in  his  company.  I  have  dipped  my  hand 
into  his  wayside  bowl  of  curry  and  rice;  I  have  walked 
with  him  through  palm  forests  in  Southern  India, 
shared  the  hospitality  of  his  roof  in  the  midst  of  Hima- 
layan snows;  listened  to  his  stories,  questioned  him, 
stood  at  his  elbows  on  the  platforms  of  railway  stations 
and  in  the  streets  of  cities,  attended  his  public  meetings 
in  villages  and  towns,  and  on  a  hundred  occasions  en- 
joyed the  frank  and  pleasant  intimacy  of  his  conversa- 
tion. Other  men  I  have  met  in  India,  greater  intellects 
and  more  powerful  personalities,  whose  acquaintance 
with  Indian  thought  is  at  once  catholic  and  sympathetic; 
but,  as  I  said  before,  none  could  give  me  so  close  and 
intimate  a  knowledge  of  the  real  and  human  India  as 
this  wandering  Don  Quixote  of   religion.     Therefore, 

1  See  Note,  page  349. 


FAKIR  SINGH  13 

though  I  am  conscious  of  many  disagreements  with  him, 
it  is  only  of  him  I  think  when  seeking  to  placate  my 
critics  and  winning  for  myself  the  confidence  of  my 
readers. 

Would  that  I  had  but  a  little  of  the  genius  of  Cer- 
vantes that  I  might  make  the  reader  feel  the  charm  and 
graciousness  of  this  noble  gentleman,  whose  perfect  bal- 
ance of  laughter  and  tears,  whose  exact  symmetry  of 
pathos  and  comedy,  whose  nice  equivalence  of  sanity 
and  madness  make  him  true  brother  of  Don  Quixote. 
In  the  manner  of  his  life  a  fanatic,  there  is  nothing  in 
his  soul  of  the  fanatic's  inhumanity.  The  severity  of  his 
visage  is  lightened  by  a  frequent  smile,  and  occasional 
bursts  of  good  laughter  witness  to  a  spirit  of  tolerance, 
good-nature,  and  cheerful  benevolence  such  as  you  will 
never  find  in  a  thoroughbred  bigot.  Full  of  enthusi- 
asm, for  ever  dreaming  dreams  and  projecting  Utopias, 
he  is  at  the  same  time  a  calm  and  wise  administrator, 
trusted,  respected,  and  consulted  by  some  of  the  very 
first  men  in  India  on  matters  needing  a  cool  head  and 
a  judicious  temperament.  He  has  the  facts  and  figures 
of  India  at  his  fingers-ends;  he  could  write  a  blue-book 
on  the  weaving-industry,  silkworms,  and  irrigation;  and 
very  easily  and  pleasantly,  believe  me,  he  could  keep 
you  up  to  the  small  hours  of  the  morning  talking  about 
the  various  mulberries  suitable  for  India,  the  need  for 
a  crusade  against  plague-spreading  rats,  the  wisdom  of 
planting  the  right  kind  of  eucalyptus  in  districts  infected 
by  malaria,  and  the  utility  of  cassava  as  a  drought-re- 
sisting plant  which  provides  a  wholesome  food  (tapi- 
oca) both  for  men  and  animals.  But  all  through  the 
march  of  these  industrial  and  political  ideas,  one  is  con- 


14  OTHER  SHEEP 

scious  in  him  above  everything  else  of  the  idealist  who 
has  made  the  great  sacrifice,  of  the  dreamer  who  has  seen 
a  vision,  and  of  the  saint  hungering  and  thirsting  for  the 
salvation  of  mankind.  He  is  a  man  busied  about  many 
things,  but  centred  in  the  reality  of  existence.  He  rides 
forth  in  turban  and  dhoti  on  the  Rozinante  of  Salva- 
•tionism  to  perform  prodigies  of  valour  and  to  win 
against  all  the  giants  of  this  world  no  less  a  kingdom 
than  India;  but,  in  spite  of  his  strange  dress  and  the 
passion  of  his  challenge,  there  is  in  his  heart  nothing 
more  than  a  great  love  for  humanity  and  the  simple  faith 
of  a  little  child. 

He  is  such  a  man  who  founds  no  empires  and  be- 
queathes no  throne,  but  who  inspires  the  affection  of 
friends  and  the  respect  of  enemies,  and  leaves  behind 
him  a  memory  of  the  noblest  virtue  and  the  purest 
heroism. 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA 

It  is  an  experience  of  unforgettable  enchantment  to  pass 
for  the  first  time  from  the  hurly  of  England's  wintry 
skies  to  the  calm  azure  and  pellucid  beauty  of  the  East. 
A  blinding  snowstorm  and  bitter  cold  at  Brindisi,  a  mel- 
ancholy passage  through  leaden  seas  and  drenching  rain 
to  Port  Said,  and  then,  suddenly,  as  if  half  the  world 
had  dropped  away  behind  one  —  air  that  is  like  melted 
pearls,  a  sky  blue  as  forget-me-nots,  a  sun  red-gold  as 
the  core  of  a  furnace,  and  stillness 

.     .     .     .     quiet  as  a  Nun 
Breathless    with    adoration. 

It  is  as  though  a  magician  had  translated  one  in  sleep 
to  some  delicious  palace  of  ensorcellment  in  the  upper 
air.  Through  the  long  corridor  of  the  Suez  Canal,  with 
its  tapestries  of  tawny  desert  and  sombre  palms  and  car- 
avans of  camels,  this  magician  leads  the  wondering 
traveller  into  the  wide  gallery  of  the  Red  Sea,  haunted 
by  ghosts  of  Israelites  and  murmurous  with  the  wheels 
of  Pharaoh's  chariots.  Along  this  gallery  whispering 
of  the  past,  the  traveller  is  led  to  the  sunset  curtain  of 
Aden,  which  the  magician  draws  to  one  side,  disclosing 
the  glimmering  atrium  of  the  Arabian  Sea.  And  now 
across  this  vast  and  lovely  vestibule,  whose  roof  at  night 
burns  with  the  brightest  stars,  and  where  the  Southern 
Cross  hangs  like  a  window  into  heaven  above  the  verge 

IS 


i6  OTHER  SHEEP 

of  the  moonlit  mosaic  of  the  sea,  drawing  always  more 
joy  into  his  heart  and  feeling  himself  more  and  more 
the  victim  of  hallucination,  the  traveller  moves  into 
bluer  waters  and  under  more  burning  skies,  till  he 
comes  at  last  to  the  Gateway  of  the  Kingdom  of 
Dreams,  and  finds  himself  standing  on  the  shore  of  a 
New  World. 

Everything  is  different.  The  air  is  heavy  with  a  new 
fragrance.  The  traveller  is  conscious,  in  a  drowsy  som- 
nambulism, of  a  breathing  and  a  scent,  of  a  glamour 
and  a  heat,  which  are  new  to  him  and  make  a  strange 
atmosphere  for  his  soul. 

He  is  aware  of  change  absolute  and  complete,  both  in 
the  heavens  and  in  the  various  humanity  passing  before 
his  eyes  like  figures  in  a  dream.  The  sun,  little  more 
intolerable  than  the  hottest  of  our  summer  days,  the 
same  sun  that  was  pleasant  and  innocuous  in  Egypt,  has 
here  a  devil  and  is  full  of  peril  for  the  human  brain. 
It  dazzles  the  white  walls  of  the  houses,  it  burns  upon 
the  overhead  wires  of  electric  trams,  it  glows  on  the 
cobbles  of  the  streets,  it  blazes  on  the  dark  leaves  and 
hanging  dusty  roots  of  the  banyan  tree  —  and  its  light 
is  not  the  jovial  gladness  of  rejoicing  summer,  but  the 
anger  of  hostility  and  the  menace  of  madness.  You  do 
not  rejoice  in  this  beautiful  sun,  you  fear  it  and  you 
may  even  come  to  hate  it. 

But  this  fear  of  the  sun  is  forgotten  in  the  new  and 
insistent  witchery  of  India's  humanity.  The  traveller 
finds  himself  staring  and  open-mouthed,  like  a  child  at 
a  puppet  show.  He  sees  a  beautiful  city  of  noble  archi- 
tecture and  spacious  streets  occupied  and  possessed  by 
such  strange  and  incongruous  people  that  their  serious- 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  17 

ness  and  solemnity  strike  him  at  first  as  a  wonderful 
jest.  It  is  not  at  all  with  offence  to  the  Indians,  but 
rather  as  a  stricture  on  the  parochialism  of  the  traveller, 
that  I  compare  this  first  sensation  of  amused  astonish- 
ment to  the  feeling  of  the  ridiculous  which  overtakes  a 
visitor  to  zoological  gardens.  One  laughs  at  solemn 
giraffes,  serious  pelicans,  and  disdainful  ostriches  chiefly 
because  they  are  not  laughing  self-consciously  at  them- 
selves. *' What  are  you  laughing  at?"  demanded  an 
ugly  bus  driver  of  a  giggling  cabman.  "What!  don't 
you  ever  laugh  when  you  look  in  the  glass  ?  "  was  the 
rejoinder,  ending  in  the  chastening  reproof  — "  why,  a 
joke's  thrown  away  on  you."  "  Un  paysage,"  says 
Amiel,  "  est  un  etat  d'ame."  Coleridge  teaches  that  the 
passion  and  the  life  of  outward  forms  have  their  foun- 
tains in  the  human  soul.  If  the  traveller  in  India  on  his 
first  shock  of  astonishment  wonder  why  the  remarkable 
people  crowding  the  streets  and  thronging  the  open 
shops  are  not  smiling  at  their  own  absurdity,  it  is  mani- 
festly because  he  is  centred  in  his  insularity  and  blinded 
by  his  habituated  Westernism. 

But  he  may  surely  be  excused  for  this  first  gaucherie. 
To  begin  with  there  is  the  question  of  hats.  In  Europe 
eccentricity  in  head-dress  is  the  exclusive  province  of 
women;  in  India  it  belongs  solely  to  men.  The  little, 
thin-armed,  straight-legged  women  of  India  go  by  with- 
out hats  of  any  kind,  either  exposing  their  coco-nut- 
oiled  black  hair  entirely  to  the  blaze  of  the  sun,  or  else 
drawing  half-way  over  their  heads  a  portion  of  the  cloth 
which  only  partially  conceals  their  bodies.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  good  gentlemen  of  India  sport  every  kind  of 
hat  imaginable.     The  old  and  bespectacled  Parsi  goes 


i8  OTHER  SHEEP 

by  in  a  tall,  brimless,  and  patent-leather  erection  which 
strikes  a  compromise  between  the  mitre  of  a  bishop  and 
a  domestic  coal-scuttle  stood  upon  its  end;  the  younger 
and  frock-coated  Parsi  saunters  along  under  a  little 
dove-coloured  dome  like  a  pudding-basin  with  just 
a  narrow  pediment  of  fur  for  the  rim.  Here  comes  a 
bearded  Muhamadan  with  a  turban  so  huge  that  one 
thinks  at  first  he  is  a  dhobi  carrying  home  somebody's 
washing  on  his  head;  and  here  comes  a  jolly  little  fat 
Hindu  wearing  a  scarlet  turban  no  bigger  than  the  pad 
affected  by  our  peripatetic  adventurers  in  muffins  and 
crumpets.  Between  these  two  sizes  and  shapes  in 
turbans,  you  see  on  the  heads  of  the  unconscious  people 
a  hundred  fantastic  contrivances  in  swaddling-cloth  of 
every  colour  under  the  sun.  If  all  the  tulips  in  Kew 
Gardens  started  to  walk  about  at  a  level  of  five  feet  and 
a  few  inches  from  the  ground,  really  they  would  not 
make  so  notable  a  chiaroscuro  as  the  turbans  of  an 
Indian  city. 

In  addition  to  the  turbans  you  have  the  fez  of  the 
cab-driver,  the  chocolate-coloured  skull  cap  of  the 
Kashmiri,  the  flat  fur  roll  and  flowing  drapery  of 
the  Dervish,  the  comical  wide-brimmed  straw  hat  of 
the  Chinaman,  the  sort  of  busby  or  bearskin  of  the  hill- 
man,  the  embroidered  smoking-cap  of  the  Muhamadan, 
the  polo-cap  of  the  Babu,  and  the  mountainous  rust- 
coloured  natural  hair  of  the  mendicant  and  the  pilgrim. 
Moreover,  these  masculine  adornments  of  the  head  are 
only  a  detail  in  the  general  raiment  of  the  peoples,  which 
is  so  diverse  and  many-coloured  that  it  is  like  a  pageant 
to  stand  at  any  street  corner  or  to  sit  at  any  window  of 
the  city. 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  19 

Most  of  the  people  go  barefoot,  and  the  clothing  of  a 
vast  multitude  of  them  suggests  nothing  more  compli- 
cated than  a  bathing  costume  topped  by  a  towel  round 
the  head.  The  garments  of  the  women  reach  a  little 
below  the  knees,  leave  the  arms  naked,  and  disclose  a 
part  of  the  sides;  the  colours  of  these  saris  are  always 
beautiful  and  becoming,  and  never  give  the  most  exact- 
ing taste  the  smallest  sense  of  vulgarity  or  absurdity. 
Many  of  the  men  wear  Western  clothes,  but  some  of 
them  as  a  concession  to  Oriental  feeling  leave  the  front 
flap  of  their  linen  shirts  hanging  outside,  like  a  sporan, 
from  under  their  waistcoats.  Parsis  affect  broadcloth, 
or  alpaca  frock  coat  and  linen  trousers,  but  consider  a 
cravat  either  a  superfluity  or  a  wanton  obscuration  of 
a  gilded  collar-stud.  The  true  native,  however,  sticks 
to  his  handsome  robes  or  his  becoming  dhoti,  and  the 
dazzling  streets  of  the  cities  are  made  joyful  and  beau- 
tiful by  these  splendid  colours  and  these  gorgeous  folds. 
Nothing  can  exceed  in  dignity  the  figure  of  a  tall  Mus- 
sulman, with  flowing  beard  and  eagle  eyes,  clad  from 
head  to  foot  in  shimmering  white,  standing  on  the  steps 
of  a  mosque  and  fresh  from  his  meditations  with  Allah 
surveying  the  toy-like  and  doU's-house  effect  of  a  native 
bazaar.  And  nothing  that  I  have  ever  seen  excels  in 
beauty  the  figure  of  a  Hindu  woman  dressed  in  a  gold- 
edged  robe  of  royal  blue  crossing  a  green  rice-field  with 
one  chocolate-coloured  arm  raised  to  support  a  brazen 
vessel  on  her  head,  the  other  swinging,  sun-glinted,  at 
her  side,  with  as  much  strength  as  dignity.  Of  a  truth 
there  is  beauty  and  nobility  among  these  peoples  as  well 
as  drollery  and  childishness;  but  it  is  not  at  first  that 
one  perceives  the  glory  of  their  vestments.     It  is  easier 


20  OTHER  SHEEP 

for  the  curious  European  to  laugh  at  the  scarlet-dyed 
beard  of  an  old  copper-coloured  gentleman  incessantly- 
munching  nuts  while  he  squats  listening  on  the  open-air 
counter  of  his  shop  to  the  reading  of  a  religious  book 
by  a  spectacled  friend  with  a  tag  of  hair  projecting  like 
a  rat's  tail  from  the  back  of  his  shaven  head,  than  to 
admire  the  beauty  of  the  total  pageant. 

Perhaps  it  is  the  blending  of  dignity  and  absurdity 
which  leaves  the  final  impression  on  a  traveller's  mind 
and  finds  him  with  mixed  feelings  when  he  comes  to 
sort  his  ideas.  For  instance,  there  is  a  handsome  tree- 
shaded  road  in  Bombay,  running  between  gardens  and 
the  sea,  where  the  rich  and  fashionable  take  the  air  from 
five  to  eight  o'clock  of  an  evening,  and  where  you  may 
see  more  splendour  in  five  minutes  than  any  capital  of 
Europe  could  show  you  in  a  week ;  here  you  may  behold 
in  the  midst  of  motor  cars  and  lordly  chariots  a  fine 
brougham  drawn  by  a  pair  of  tall  horses,  with  two 
flunkeys  on  the  box  and  two  flunkeys  at  the  back, 
carrying  in  its  drab-lined  interior  a  Parsi  lady  dressed  in 
the  most  delicate  pale  silks  imaginable,  who,  leaning  back 
on  her  cushions,  rests  a  naked  biscuit-coloured  foot 
on  the  ledge  of  the  door,  every  toe  twinkling  in  the  sun. 
And  I  think  that  if  one  looks  long  enough  there  is  always 
a  humorous  nakedness  protruding  somewhere  or  another 
from  the  pomp  and  glory  of  the  gorgeous  East. 

Above  and  beyond,  infinitely  beyond  the  interest  of  the 
clothes,  is  the  interest  of  Eastern  physiognomy.  The 
traveller  soon  learns  the  truth  of  a  statement  made  by 
Sir  Bamfylde  Fuller  in  his  "  Studies  of  Indian  Life  and 
Sentiment,"  that  it  requires  actual  experience  to  realize 
the  astounding  truth  that  "the  population  of  a  district 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  21 

or  a  town  is  a  collection  of  different  nationalities  — 
almost  different  species  —  of  mankind/'  This  same 
author  declares  that  it  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that 
"  the  inhabitants  of  India  are  differentiated  into  over 
two  thousand  species  of  mankind,  which  in  the  physical 
relations  of  life  have  as  little  in  common  as  the  inmates 
of  a  zoological  garden/'  You  cannot  imagine,  unless 
you  have  visited  India  and  really  studied  the  peoples, 
how  this  wonderful  and  amazing  diversity  contributes  to 
the  delight  and  interest  of  the  country.  The  traveller, 
new  to  this  crowding  pageant  of  humanity,  is  not  a 
calm  and  critical  observer  among  one  people  solid  in  a 
single  nationalism,  but  is  a  drifting  and  bewildered  unit 
shouldered  and  jostled  by  over  two  thousand  species  of 
humanity,  each  separated  from  the  other  by  unbridge- 
able gulfs  of  thought  and  feeling.  His  politeness  to 
one  is  almost  an  affront  to  a  hundred  others ;  his  famil- 
iarity with  the  language  of  one  is  but  double-dutch  to 
the  rest.  The  Muhamadans  are  divided  into  sects  that 
are  at  sword's  point  with  one  another;  the  Hindus  are 
multiplied  into  many  nations  and  hundreds  of  castes; 
there  is  schism  among  the  Buddhists;  and  the  hills  of 
the  north  are  inhabited  by  half-savage  and  entirely 
savage  peoples  each  as  separate  and  distinct  from  the 
other  as  all  are  separate  and  distinct  from  the  peoples 
of  the  plains.  With  an  area  only  a  little  more  than  half 
that  of  Australasia,  India  and  Ceylon  carry  under  the 
stars  a  fifth  of  the  entire  human  race,  and  this  fifth, 
packed  into  so  small  a  compass,  is  divided  into  over  two 
thousand  species  of  mankind,  utters  its  thoughts  in  twenty 
main  languages  and  over  five  hundred  differing  dialects, 
and  is  infinitely  more  split  up  and  fragmentary  than  all 


2'2  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  peoples  of  Europe,  both  in  traditions  and  the  com- 
mon habits  of  daily  life. 

This  astonishing  variety  appears  in  the  faces  of  the 
peoples.  To  the  European,  one  Japanese  is  as  like  an- 
other Japanese  as  one  sheep  is  like  another  sheep;  but 
to  the  European,  even  in  the  first  hours  of  his  arrival 
on  Indian  soil,  the  inhabitants  stand  out  from  each  other 
with  a  difference  as  complete  as  that  which  separates 
horses  from  dogs,  or  thrushes  from  chaffinches.  The 
earliest  impression  is  made  by  the  strange  paint  marks 
on  the  foreheads  of  these  peoples.  He  sees  men  with 
three  white  bars  across  the  brow,  like  a  hurdle;  others 
with  two  upright  strokes  of  white  running  up  to  the 
hair;  others  with  two  similar  upright  strokes  of  white, 
but  divided  by  a  significant  line  of  vermilion;  others 
with  foreheads  plastered  all  over  with  grey  ash ;  and  still 
others  with  a  spot  of  scarlet  between  the  eyebrows,  like 
a  holly-berry  or  a  particularly  jovial  wart.  In  naked 
savages  these  marks  would  appear  natural  or  seemly; 
but  on  the  foreheads  of  serious  gentlemen  in  Euro- 
pean clothes  or  venerable,  benign  and  bearded  Father 
Abrahams  in  noble  turbans  and  robes  of  apostolic  gran- 
deur, they  have  a  most  bizarre  and  disturbing  effect. 
Soon,  however,  the  eyes  get  accustomed  to  these  caste 
marks,  these  religious  or  social  symbols  which  shout  to 
the  beholder,  "  I  am  a  fine  fellow,"  or  "  I  believe  in  such 
a  god."  After  the  first  shock  of  amused  surprise,  un- 
distracted  and  undisgusted,  the  gaze  settles  itself  to  ob- 
serve in  the  people  their  mould  of  features  and  the  play 
of  their  expressions. 

As  various  as  the  shades  of  their  colouring,  which 
move  from  a  sad  yellow  through  every  hue  of  brown 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  23 

up  to  an  ebonized  black,  are  the  features  and  expressions 
of  the  Indian  peoples.  One  man  is  noble  and  kingly,  like 
a  Roman  Em_peror  or  an  English  judge;  another  is  as 
Mongolian  as  a  Chinaman ;  a  third  as  hook-nosed,  crafty, 
and  dislikable  as  Shylock ;  a  fourth  as  beautiful  as  Moses 
or  Elijah;  a  fifth  as  bulbous-featured  as  a  caricature; 
a  sixth  absolutely  as  negroid  and  animal  as  a  South 
African  savage;  a  seventh  like  Flaxman's  drawing  of 
the  grizzled  Ulysses  leaning  on  his  staff;  an  eighth 
majestical  and  superb,  like  one's  imagined  Akbar;  a  ninth 
like  the  low-foreheaded  mummies  of  the  Pharaohs;  a 
tenth  heavy,  plethoric,  sad-eyed,  tall-browed  and  thick- 
bearded  like  the  late  Lord  Salisbury;  an  eleventh  like  a 
Red  Indian;  a  twelfth  like  one  of  Mr.  Reed's  prehistoric 
men;  and  a  thirteenth  close-lipped,  self -consequential, 
and  stern  like  a  County  Councillor  or  an  esteemed  mem- 
ber of  a  London  Vestry. 

There  is  not  this  remarkable  and  complete  difference 
among  the  women.  The  suppressed  and  trivial  life 
forced  upon  them  by  tradition  probably  accounts  for  an 
uninteresting  sameness  affecting  both  Hindus  and  Mu- 
hamadans.  The  men,  on  the  other  hand,  with  three 
hundred  million  gods  to  choose  from,  furiously  inter- 
ested in  the  incessant  strife  of  their  contending  religions 
and  the  incessant  feud  of  their  innumerable  politics,  and 
with  the  business  of  money-getting  and  money-hoarding 
always  occupying  their  unsleeping  brains,  live  more  in 
the  world,  and  are  marked  by  all  the  passions  of  the 
market-place  and  all  the  jealousies  and  superstitions  of 
the  temple.  It  is,  indeed,  impossible  to  exaggerate  the 
impression  made  upon  a  quiet  and  observing  mind  by 
this  wonderful  facial   diversity  of  the   Indian  peoples. 


24  OTHER  SHEEP 

a  diversity  which  is  not  merely  spread  over  the  vast 
extent  of  India's  geography,  but  which  may  be  seen  in 
a  single  street  in  Bombay  in  the  course  of  half-an-hour's 
walk. 

In  the  dusty  and  heavy-smelling  bazaars,  which  are 
narrow  streets  composed  of  dolls'-house-looking  build- 
ings of  painted  boards,  with  shutters  to  the  upper  win- 
dows, and  open  shops  on  the  ground  floor  rather  bigger 
than  rabbit-hutches  and  raised  two  or  three  feet  from  the 
gutter  on  stumps  of  wood  —  in  the  bazaars,  these 
thronging  figures  talking  in  the  road,  entering  mosque 
or  temple,  sitting  cross-legged  in  the  shops,  or  sharing 
a  hookah  on  a  balcony,  appear  natural  and  congruous  in 
spite  of  their  conflicting  variety.  But  you  cannot  imag- 
ine unless  you  have  seen  it,  what  a  strange  effect  is  pro- 
duced by  this  immense  diversity  of  race  and  raiment 
in  those  modern  parts  of  an  Indian  city  where  the  stone 
buildings  are  magnificent,  where  motor-cars  glide  in  and 
out  of  gong-sounding  electric  trams,  and  shopkeepers 
exhibit  in  fine  windows  all  the  comforts  and  inventions 
of  European  luxury.  Long-robed  figures  like  Levitical 
priests  pass  slowly  in  front  of  these  commercial  win- 
dows, an  electric  tram  crowded  with  turbans  and 
dhoties  goes  swinging  round  the  corner  of  a  huge  hotel ; 
a  string  of  little  carts  filled  with  cotton  and  drawn  by 
tiny  white  bullocks,  the  tail-twisting  and  stick-flourish- 
ing drivers  sitting  on  the  pole,  goes  bumping  over  the 
cobbles,  past  the  showrooms  of  a  French  milliner ;  under 
a  banyan  tree  outside  the  great  oflice  of  an  electrical 
engineer,  the  barber,  sitting  on  his  haunches,  is  shaving 
the  bowed  head  of  a  crouching  Hindu;  sitting  on  the 
kerb,  resting  her  back  against  the  standard  of  an  electric 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  25 

tight,  a  woman  —  oblivious  to  all  the  world  —  is  search- 
ing the  head  of  her  daughter  for  undesirable  lodgers; 
in  the  shadow  of  a  garage  filled  with  snorting  cars  and 
perspiring  chauffeurs,  the  ear  doctor  is  consumedly  en- 
gaged with  iron  instruments  down  the  burrow  of  a  boy's 
ear;  and  the  dirty,  round-shouldered,  cigarette-smoking 
gharry- wallah,  sitting  cross-legged  on  the  box  of  his 
little  rubber-tyred  Victoria,  is  one  man ;  the  half-naked 
Hindu,  beating  his  oxen,  on  a  water-cart,  is  another  man ; 
the  benign  and  whiskered  Parsi  money-lender,  under 
his  white  silk  umbrella  is  another  man;  the  Goanese 
servant  in  spotless  white  linen  carrying  a  bouquet  of 
flowers  to  his  mistress  is  another  man;  the  policeman 
in  flat,  yellow  cap,  blue  tunic,  and  blue  breeches  ending 
in  bare  calves  is  another  man;  and  so  on,  all  the  way 
through  these  splendid  streets  and  beautiful  avenues  — 
every  other  man  different  and  interesting,  every  face 
telling  a  different  story  of  religion  and  custom,  and  every 
shadow  on  the  dazzling  stones  falling  from  a  different 
road  and  a  different  journey. 

It  is  almost  uncanny  to  walk  alone  through  the  streets 
of  an  Indian  city  at  night.  The  bare  feet  of  the  people 
make  it  seem  as  though  the  grave  had  given  up  its 
sheeted  dead;  they  pass  one  without  sound,  they  flit  by 
one  as  noiselessly  as  moths,  they  start  up  out  of  dark 
places  or  come  round  street  corners  with  a  silence  that 
almost  takes  away  the  breath.  And  later  in  the  night, 
if  the  traveller  penetrates  to  the  quiet  native  streets,  he 
finds  the  pavements,  the  doorways,  the  staircases,  and 
the  corridors  strewn  with  white-robed  figures  sleeping 
with  the  stillness  and  the  quiet  of  the  dead,  while  from 
some  window  above  sounds  the  monotonous  drone  of 


26  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  tom-tom  and  the  nasal  wail  of  a  nautch  girl.  An 
Indian  can  sit  for  an  hour  on  his  haunches,  only  the 
feet  touching  the  ground;  and  he  can  sleep  as  comfort- 
ably on  the  bare  stones  of  the  pavement  outside  his  house 
as  any  European  can  sleep  on  a  spring-mattress. 

One  has  to  remind  oneself  again  and  again  that  these 
interesting  and  delightful  people  not  only  differ  violently 
from  each  other  in  the  matter  of  religion  and  in  the 
habits  of  social  life,  but  that  they  are  all  absolutely  and 
perfectly  different  from  us  in  the  whole  range  of  in- 
tellectual outlook.  It  is  natural  to  suppose  when  pass- 
ing a  British-looking  gentleman  in  a  more  or  less  Euro- 
pean suit  of  clothes  or  in  buying  a  box  of  cigarettes  from 
a  charming  old  man  who  puts  one  in  mind  of  some  Bibli- 
cal hero,  that  however  greatly  his  complexion  may  differ 
from  one's  own,  however  unusual  his  costume  would 
appear  in  Paris  or  London,  however  crimson  his  teeth 
may  be  with  the  chewing  of  betel,  that  the  premises  of 
his  philosophy,  the  postulates  of  his  science  of  life,  are 
very  much  the  same  as  one's  own.  But,  insularity  is  a 
sad  blunderer.  This  polite  and  even  jest-making  Hindu 
believes  that  the  world  is  flat;  his  god  is  a  mixture  of 
Bacchus,  Don  Juan,  and  Dick  Turpin ;  he  would  no  more 
be  seen  walking  side  by  side  with  his  wife  than  killing 
a  cow;  he  would  no  more  sit  down  to  meals  with  his 
wife  and  daughters  than  he  would  say  his  prayers  in  a 
mosque;  he  regards  science  as  an  absurd  delusion;  he 
considers  that  women  have  no  souls  to  speak  of;  and 
as  for  your  honoured,  superior,  and  complacent  self  he 
holds  in  his  heart  that  you  are  filthy  in  your  habits,  mad 
in  your  ideas,  and  loathsome  to  the  gods. 

I  found  myself  saying  very  often  as  I  walked  in  the 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  27 

wide  and  magnificent  streets  of  Indian  cities,  *'  All  these 
people  believe  that  the  world  is  flat."  The  phrase  re- 
peated itself  involuntarily,  until  my  mind  seized  the  full 
significance  of  its  monotony.  They  inhabit  a  different 
world  from  ours.  We  buy  and  sell  with  them,  we  laugh 
and  talk  together,  we  are  as  good  friends  as  they  will 
let  us  be,  and  we  are  never  likely  seriously  to  fall  out 
and  come  to  a  bloody  rupture  —  but,  the  thoughts  of 
their  hearts  are  not  our  thoughts,  the  aspiration  of  their 
souls  is  not  our  aspiration,  and  in  everything  which 
makes  man  a  rational  creature  different  from  all  the 
animal  creation  they  are  as  separate  and  distinct  from 
us  as  the  earth  from  the  moon. 

Here,  I  think,  is  one  aspect  of  India's  romance.  The 
peoples,  separated  among  themselves  into  over  two 
thousand  species  of  mankind,  are  so  separated  from  us 
that  they  are  like  inhabitants  of  another  world.  They 
have  a  different  morality  and  a  different  geography. 
They  are  so  constituted  that  they  can  conceive  of  a  god, 
and  even  worship  him,  who  violates  every  canon  of  their 
own  moral  code  and  would  seem  a  frightful  monster  to 
the  London  hooligan.  They  think  of  disease  and 
drought  and  dreams  in  a  manner  laughable  to  the  young- 
est schoolboy.  They  have  no  knowledge  of  the  globe, 
no  interest  in  the  discoveries  of  science,  and  no  respect 
for  the  inventions  of  civilization.  They  shrink  from 
taking  life,  and  yet  they  will  let  a  dog  die  of  starvation 
before  their  eyes,  or  contemplate  unmoved  the  agony 
of  a  wounded  ox.  They  go  to  our  surgeons  and  doc- 
tors, make  use  of  our  telegraph  and  telephone,  but  the 
Jains  among  them  will  pay  a  man  to  sleep  in  the  bed  they 
are  leaving  for  a  few  nights,  so  that  the  fleas  and  bugs 


28  OTHER  SHEEP 

may  not  perish  of  starvation.  And  these  three  hundred 
millions  of  people,  inhabiting  so  different  a  universe  from 
ours,  are  controlled  in  their  political  destiny  by  a  mere 
handful  of  Englishmen;  their  rivers  are  being  har- 
nessed by  English  engineers,  their  woods  conserved  and 
developed  by  English  foresters,  their  deserts  improved 
into  thriving  fields  by  English  agriculturists,  their  mines 
ransacked  for  gold  and  coal  by  the  same  quiet  and  re- 
lentless power,  and  even  the  serenity  of  their  blue  sky 
is  now  being  clouded  by  the  factory  smoke  of  these  same 
islanders  from  the  West.  Firm  and  immovable  as  they 
appear  to  stand  in  their  immemorial  beliefs,  these  three 
hundred  millions  of  human  beings  are  silently  and  im- 
perceptibly altering  the  texture  of  their  minds  and  com- 
prehending a  new  significance  in  life.  The  man  who 
ascends  with  you  in  the  lift  of  an  hotel  and  tells  you 
that  the  world  is  flat,  has  a  son  who  is  reading  Herbert 
Spencer;  and  even  though  the  son  may  still  believe  in 
Krishna  and  smother  himself  in  simulated  blood  on  the 
obscene  and  disgusting  festival  of  Holi,  he  studies  John 
Stuart  Mill  and  ranks  himself  a  synthetical  philoso- 
pher. 

Consider  the  romance  of  this  British  governance.  In 
the  direct  civil  government  of  the  two  hundred  and 
thirty  millions  of  British  India  and  in  the  partial  super- 
vision and  advisory  assistance  of  the  seventy  millions 
in  Native  States,  only  twelve  hundred  Englishmen  are 
employed,  including  military  officers  attached  to  the  civil 
arm.  From  a  little  inconspicuous  island  in  the  northern 
seas,  twelve  hundred  men  bred  in  a  different  religion, 
speaking  a  different  language,  and  holding  an  entirely 
different  theory  of  the  universe,  master  and  dominate 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  29 

the  destiny  of  three  hundred  aHen  millions  —  master  and 
dominate  that  destiny  for  the  good  of  the  three  hundred 
millions  and  for  the  peace  and  security  of  the  whole 
world. 

There  are  two  secrets  for  this  romantic  state  of  af- 
fairs. First,  the  quality  of  the  Sahib  —  a  man  who 
must  never  lie,  never  take  bribes,  and  never  "  let  down  " 
a  friend;  and  second,  the  invisible  Fleet  of  England, 
which  preserves  India  from  the  greed  and  rapacity  of 
the  marauder.  It  is  in  the  inviolate  security  assured  by 
the  British  Navy  that  the  handful  of  Englishmen  domi- 
ciled in  India  do  their  work  and  keep  the  peace;  and 
those  sensational  and  tiresome  people  who  are  for  ever 
telling  us  that  we  shall  assuredly  lose  India,  forget  that 
so  long  as  the  British  Navy  holds  the  sea  it  is  just  as 
impossible  for  England  to  lose  India  as  for  the  same 
little  country  to  lose  the  county  of  Rutland. 

To  an  extent  greater  than  the  average  Englishman 
knows,  India  is  a  self-governing  country.  Next  in  im- 
portance to  the  864  Civil  charges,  which  are  mostly 
held  by  members  of  the  Indian  Civil  Service,  including 
Indians,  the  next  3,700  superior  judicial  and  executive 
appointments  are  all  held  by  Indians,  with  about  100 
exceptions.  Nearly  every  subordinate  position  is  held 
by  Indians. 

In  the  case  of  the  Cities,  there  are  742  municipalities 
controlled  by  9,800  representatives,  of  whom  half  are 
elected  by  the  people  and  the  other  half  selected  by  Gov- 
ernment from  amongst  the  wisest  and  most  intelligent 
of  India's  philanthropic  and  public-spirited  men  of  af- 
fairs. The  Rural  Population  is  similarly  controlled  by 
1,073    Districts    and    Local    Boards,    on    which    15,800 


30  OTHER  SHEEP 

of  India's  leaders  serve,  half  by  election  and  half  by 
selection. 

These  few  figures,  wonderfully  eloquent  of  British 
methods  and  the  confidence  guaranteed  by  the  British 
Navy,  effectually  sweep  away  the  foolish  contention  of 
harebrained  sentimentalists  that  India  is  a  country  liv- 
ing under  the  tyranny  of  an  alien  Government.  The 
twelve  hundred  Englishmen  in  India  are  working  in 
association  with  the  sanest  Indian  intellects  for  the  glory 
and  power,  the  happiness  and  prosperity,  the  peace  and 
order  of  India  herself;  and  if  in  single  particulars  they 
appear  to  run  counter  to  Indian  demands  it  is  only  be- 
cause the  granting  of  those  demands,  in  their  honest  and 
considered  judgment,  would  weaken  the  connection 
with  England  and  so  imperil  the  absolute  peace  guaran- 
teed by  the  British  Navy,  which  is  essential  to  the  evolu- 
tion of  India's  destiny. 

Picture  to  yourself  what  would  happen  if  we  with- 
drew from  India.  First,  the  Parsis  would  flee  for 
their  lives,  carrying  I  know  not  how  much  wealth  and 
intelligence  out  of  the  country.  Then  the  Muhama- 
dans  w^ould  attempt  to  settle  by  musket  and  knife  those 
furious  sectarian  differences  which  resulted  in  bloodshed 
during  the  last  Mohurrum.  Hindus  would  seize  the  op- 
portunity to  fall  upon  the  hated  Mussulman;  Rajah 
would  march  against  Rajah;  like  a  flooding  sea  the 
long-knifed  heathen  of  the  hills  would  descend  upon  the 
plains;  and  the  navies  of  European  and  Asiatic  powers, 
eager  for  the  rich  fruit  of  Indian  prosperity,  would  ap- 
pear at  different  parts  of  the  coast  and  proceed  to  annex 
all  that  they  could  hold  of  India's  soil.  The  miracle 
of  a  single  India,   only  brought   into   existence  by  the 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  31 

genius  of  England,  and  only  possible  so  long  as  the 
British  Navy  holds  the  sea,  would  disappear,  and  once 
again,  as  it  was  in  the  beginning,  the  continent  of  India 
would  be  split  up  into  a  hundred  warring  and  discordant 
countries. 

These  people,  whose  destiny  has  come  into  our  hands 
by  the  providence  of  God,  are  children,  and  like  the  Chil- 
dren of  Israel,  they  are  on  a  great  march  from  servitude 
to  freedom,  from  darkness  to  light,  from  ignorance  to 
knowledge.  To  set  such  a  wicked  and  crazy  person  as 
the  "  patriot  "  Tilak  at  their  head,  who  has  not  only  in- 
spired the  murder  of  noble  men,  but  has  actually  justified 
murder  as  a  holy  thing,  is  an  outrage.^  To  inflame  them 
with  the  speeches  recently  made  by  a  certain  English  So- 
cialist travelling  through  the  country,  is  a  crime.  Even 
to  permit  a  European  woman  to  make  Benares  the  head- 
quarters for  a  theosophical  propaganda,  which  may  pos- 
sibly have  as  disastrous  results  for  the  British  Raj  as  for 
the  evolution  of  Christianity  in  India,  is  a  hazardous  ex- 
periment in  laissez-faire.  These  are  not  only  the  views 
of  the  best  Englishmen  in  India;  they  are  the  opinions 
of  the  best  Indians  themselves. 

It  would  be  much  better,   able  and  responsible  men 

1  "  The  Divine  Krishna  teaching  in  the  Gita  tells  us  we  may  kill 
even  our  teachers  and  our  kinsmen.  .  .  .  Rise  above  the  Penal 
Code  into  the  rarefied  atmosphere  of  the  sacred  Bhaghavad  Gita  and 
consider  the  action  of  great  men."  Tilak  was  here  speaking  with 
enthusiasm  of  the  Mahratta  leader,  Shivaji,  who  persuaded  the 
Muhamadan  General,  Afzul  Khan,  "to  meet  him  in  peaceful  con- 
ference half-way  between  the  contending  armies,  and,  as  he  bent 
down  to  greet  his  guest,  plunged  into  his  bowels  the  famous  *  tiger's 
claw,'  a  hooked  gauntlet  of  steel,  while  a  Mahratta  force  sprang  out 
of  ambush  and  cut  the  Muhamadan  army  in  pieces." —  Quoted  in 
Indian  Unrest,  by  Valentine  Chirol. 


32  OTHER  SHEEP 

assure  me,  if  England  made  her  whole  mind  on  this  sub- 
ject quite  clear  to  the  Children  of  India.  She  should 
acknowledge  by  the  mouth  of  the  King-Emperor  that 
the  ideal  of  Indian  Self-Government  is  a  just  and  hon- 
ourable aspiration,  and  she  should  declare  her  willing- 
ness to  further  this  worthy  movement  in  every  way 
consonant  with  law  and  order ;  but  in  most  emphatic  lan- 
guage, and  in  every  part  of  the  country,  and  on  every 
possible  occasion,  she  should  point  out  that  such  a  con- 
summation is  only  possible  while  India's  internal  peace 
is  secured  by  the  British  Navy  (to  which  India  makes 
no  contribution  whatever),  and  announce  her  unwaver- 
ing determination  to  destroy  any  influence  at  work  which 
is  in  the  least  degree  likely  to  corrupt  the  authority  of 
the  central  Government  or  weaken  the  connection  be- 
tween the  two  countries.  And  what  she  threatens  to  do, 
she  should  do.  A  wise  statesman  would  as  mercifully 
remove  such  creatures  as  Tilak,  who  dare  to  justify 
murder,  as  a  man  of  science  would  remove  a  malignant 
growth  from  the  human  body.  And  India  would  re- 
spect such  action.  "  There  are  three  talkers  in  India,'' 
an  able  member  of  the  Civil  Service  told  me;  "  the  man 
with  a  just  grievance  —  whose  grievance  should  be  re- 
moved ;  the  man  who  talks  for  the  sake  of  talking  —  and 
who  may  be  left  talking;  and  the  man  openly  bent  on 
overthrowing  the  British  tutelage  —  who  should  be 
hanged." 

Let  it  be  always  borne  in  mind  that  the  intelligent 
Indians  are  less  than  a  handful  in  comparison  with  the 
millions  who  can  neither  read  nor  write,  and  that  there 
are  literally  millions,  surrounding  the  virtuous  peoples 
of    India,    who    practise    as    a    quite    ordinary    matter 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  33 

immoralities  which  would  bring  them  into  the  eriminal 
courts  of  Europe.  The  ignorance  of  some  of  the  mil- 
lions of  India,  as  this  book  will  show,  is  something  so 
incredible  that  it  is  difficult  to  think  of  them  as  human 
beings.  And  the  immoralities  of  many  of  them  are  so 
horrible  and  revolting  that  it  is  almost  possible  to  think 
of  them  as  the  creation  of  infernal  power. 

But  the  true  designation  for  these  people,  the  very 
worst  of  whom  are  docile  and  charming,  is  that  of  this 
chapter's  heading.  They  are  children.  One  must  not 
think  of  them  as  grown  men  nor  judge  them  by  a  single 
European  standard.  They  are  different  from  us  in 
almost  every  particular  that  makes  man  an  intellectual 
being.  Like  children  they  consult  the  stars,  listen  to 
the  wind,  regard  the  lightning,  and  watch  disease  spread- 
ing death  through  their  midst.  Like  children,  they  be- 
lieve the  most  fantastic  stories  of  gods  and  demons.  Like 
children  they  accept  without  question  or  demur  anything 
told  to  them  with  the  least  semblance  of  authority.  And 
like  children  they  are  afraid  of  the  dark,  and  in  all  that 
they  attempt  to  achieve  fear  the  frustrating  enmity  of 
malicious  devils. 

Does  it  not  help  one  to  realize  the  true  state  and  con- 
dition of  these  children,  to  know  that  seventy  millions 
of  them  —  think  what  these  figures  mean  —  seventy  mil- 
lions of  them  accept  without  the  smallest  spirit  of  re- 
bellion the  unwritten  law  which  makes  them  for  the 
whole  of  their  lives  outcasts  and  helots  ?  These  seventy 
millions  know  themselves  to  be  an  abomination  and  a 
horror  to  the  castes  above  them.  Without  suspicion 
they  allow  themselves  to  be  exploited  by  the  very  people 
who  say  they  are  "  untouchable,"  and  whose  food  would 


34  OTHER  SHEEP 

be  polluted  and  uneatable  if  even  their  shadow  fell  upon 
it.  In  every  village  there  is  an  outcasts'  quarter,  sep- 
arated from  the  other  castes.  No  Brahman  priest  will 
come  near  them,  sick  or  dying.  No  caste  postman  will 
give  their  letters  into  their  hands.  No  caste  doctor 
will  attend  them  in  illness.  They  have  to  fashion  their 
own  gods  and  create  their  own  priesthood  —  a  "  black  " 
priesthood  which  is  regarded  with  unutterable  loathing 
by  the  holy  priest  in  the  sacred  temple.  And  they  do 
not  question  or  rebel.  Because  they  are  the  sons  of 
their  fathers,  they  are  what  they  are,  and  thus  they  must 
remain,  "  untouchable,"  to  the  day  of  their  death. 

Remember  always  that  the  cities  of  India  are  mere 
potting-sheds  and  greenhouses  in  the  midst  of  an  enor- 
mous garden.  Something  like  ninety  per  cent  of  the 
population  live  on  or  by  the  land,  and  these  270  rural  mil- 
lions out  of  a  rough  total  of  300  millions,  are  as  illiterate 
and  superstitious,  however  charming  in  manner,  as  any 
savages  in  the  remotest  darkness  of  Africa.  I  do  not 
mean  for  a  moment  that  they  are  repellent  and  hideous ; 
more  polite  and  engaging  people  I  have  never  met,  more 
gracious  and  hospitable  people  do  not  exist  among  the 
finest  peasantry  of  Europe  —  but  their  ignorance  and 
their  superstition  and  many  of  their  habits  are  as  bar- 
barous as  anything  to  be  found  among  the  most  savage 
heathen. 

What  is  the  root  of  this  barbarism,  extant  in  the  twen- 
tieth century  and  living  cheek  by  jowl  with  the  civiliza- 
tion of  England? 

"  Where  women  are  honoured,"  says  an  ancient  seer, 
"  the  Divinities  are  complacent ;  where  they  are  despised 
it  is  useless  to  pray  to  God." 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  35 

There  are  two  interpretations  of  the  monition  — 
Cherchez  la  femme. 

In  spite  of  the  publicity  given  by  English  newspapers 
to  the  revolutionary  ideas  of  the  "  new  woman,"  and  in 
spite  of  plays  and  novels  which  might  make  one  think 
domestic  happiness  nowhere  existed,  everybody  knows 
who  has  gone  about  the  country  at  all  that  the  centre 
of  English  life  is  the  home  and  that  the  centre  of  the 
home  is  the  Mother.  It  is  against  the  Englishwoman's 
lofty  and  calm  conception  of  Motherhood,  and  not 
against  man's  amused  indifference,  or  his  irritable  dis- 
gust, that  such  a  violent  wave  as  the  Suffragette  move- 
ment, which  must  be  distinguished  from  the  Woman 
Question,  breaks  itself  into  the  spume  of  failure  and 
the  froth  of  defeat.  To  be  the  mother  of  strong  sons 
and  beautiful  daughters  is  still  the  supreme  ambition  of 
the  Englishwoman.  And  the  home,  with  all  its  inno- 
cent pleasures  and  delightful  ambitions,  is  still  the  fixed 
and  steadfast  centre  of  our  national  righteousness. 

Nothing  of  this  sort  is  known  in  India.  Nothing  in 
the  least  degree  approximating  to  the  ideal  of  English 
motherhood  is  known  among  the  peoples  of  India.  A 
woman  may  indeed  be  a  veritable  termagant  and  make 
the  life  of  her  husband  a  scarce  endurable  martyrdom, 
but  she  is  never  his  companion  and  friend,  and  never  the 
moral  providence  and  spiritual  counsellor  of  his  children. 
She  cooks  her  husband's  meal,  but  may  not  eat  till  he  has 
finished ;  she  goes  out  to  work  in  the  fields  with  her  hus- 
band, but  may  not  walk  at  his  side.  You  will  see  women 
in  India  loading  an  engine  with  coal,  making  bricks  in 
the  brick-fields,  laying  stones  on  the  road,  bearing  hods 
of  mortar  up  the  scaffolding  of  a  new  building,   and 


36  OTHER  SHEEP 

sweeping  up  the  manure  of  the  street,  or  carrying  the 
European  pail  to  the  cess-pit;  but  you  will  never  see  a 
woman  going  arm-in-arm  with  her  husband  to  a  concert 
or  festivity,  or  playing  games  with  her  sons.  You  will 
never  see  a  happy  and  rejoicing  mother,  the  pride  of  her 
husband,  the  joy  of  her  children,  and  the  supreme  influ- 
ence for  character  and  prosperity  in  the  home. 

And  yet,  by  the  irony  of  fate,  infinitely  the  most  beau- 
tiful building  in  India,  perhaps  in  the  whole  world,  is 
that  ivory-coloured  tomb  of  loveliness  dreaming  in  a 
green  garden  on  the  banks  of  the  Jumna,  whose  slender 
minarets  and  lofty  dome,  whose  pierced  and  carven  mar- 
bles and  inlaid  walls  of  precious  stones  are  raised  as  the 
memorial  of  a  man's  love  for  a  woman.  And  not,  as 
some  people  are  disposed  to  think,  as  the  passionate  sac- 
rament of  a  lover  for  his  mistress,  of  some  Antony  for 
his  Cleopatra,  but  as  the  enduring  and  solemn  rever- 
ence of  a  husband  for  as  virtuous  and  homely  a  matron 
as  ever  brought  fourteen  children  into  life  and  died  in 
childbed.  Such  is  the  Taj  Mahal  —  a  witness  to  a  man's 
love  for  his  matronal  wife,  and  it  stands  in  a  country 
where  men  and  women  neither  walk  together  nor  eat 
together,  and  where  the  woman  is  degraded  to  the  most 
menial  and  bestial  of  toils. 

Surely  the  great  march  on  which  the  Children  of  India 
have  set  out  must  be  swift  or  slow,  victorious  or  disas- 
trous, according  to  the  place  in  it  assigned  to  women. 
As  my  book  will  show,  the  religion  of  the  West  has  a 
most  helpful  and  emancipating  effect  on  Indian  women, 
and  it  seems  to  me  almost  the  clearest  thing  in  the  diffi- 
cult destiny  of  India  that  the  ultimate  salvation  of  the 
country  lies  with  a  higher  and  nobler  domesticity  created 
by  women  conscious   of  a  righteous   God  and   a  pure 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  37 

heaven.  To  look  into  the  bright  eyes  and  smiHng  face  of 
an  Indian  woman  converted  to  Christianity  is  to  feel 
full  of  a  glad  confidence  in  India's  future,  and  to  realize 
the  supremacy  of  Christianity  as  a  force  in  human  evo- 
lution. How  different  are  one's  feelings  on  beholding 
the  most  tragic  figure  in  the  whole  world  —  an  Indian 
old  woman,  shrivelled  and  wrinkled  to  the  bone,  drag- 
ging weary  feet  through  the  dust,  frowning  at  the  sun 
out  of  watery  eyes,  and  muttering  to  herself  an  inarticu- 
late Miserere  as  she  draws  nearer  to  the  hovel  where 
no  one  is  watching  for  her  return,  no  one  will  give  her 
welcome,  and  where  in  the  darkness  of  a  corner  she  will 
eat  her  morsel  of  rice  and  fall  asleep  ignored  by  all  the 
rest  of  the  household. 

For  a  woman  to  survive  her  husband  in  India,  it  is 
purgatory ;  but  to  grow  old  in  her  widowhood  —  it  is 
hell.  The  Indian  widow  is  not  permitted  to  re-marry. 
How  must  it  be  then,  with  such  a  country,  possessing 
27,000,000  widows,  6,000,000  of  them  under  fourteen 
years  of  age,  and  14,000  of  them  under  four?  In 
zenanas,  according  to  a  Government  Census,  there  are 
40,000,000  women.  ^ 

Fundamental  to  this  chief  question  of  the  Woman,  is 
the  question  of  Religion.  Everything  in  India  is  what 
it  is  because  of  Religion.  The  problem  of  what  is  called 
"  Indian  Unrest,"  as  Mr.  Valentine  Chirol  shows  in  his 
conclusive  book  on  the  subject,  is  at  the  bottom  a 
religious  question.  The  position  of  women  is  the  ordi- 
nance of  religion.  And  truly  it  is  the  same  with  every- 
thing else  in  India  from  one  end  of  the  country  to  the 
other.  Until  the  religions  of  India  are  thrown  by  the 
peasant  as    well    as    the    Babu,    to    the  waste-heap   of 

1  See  page  350. 


38  OTHER  SHEEP 

humanity's  childishness,  until  their  gods  and  goddesses, 
their  devils  and  their  demons,  become  the  stock-in-trade 
of  the  satirist  and  the  clown,  no  real  movement  can  be 
made  from  darkness  to  light,  and  no  pulse  of  joy  and 
enthusiasm  beat  from  the  heart  of  her  various  humanity. 
And  it  is  because  this  conviction  is  to  me  so  obvious  and 
certain,  that  one  is  almost  tempted  to  regard  as  more 
serious  than  the  propaganda  of  unquiet  politicians,  that 
corner-creeping  and  unconscious  treason  of  theosophy 
which  is  exalting  Indian  philosophy  above  our  pure 
religion  breathing  household  laws,  and  is,  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  encouraging  the  easily-conceited  intellect 
of  India  to  regard  the  peoples  of  Europe  as  benighted 
savages  and  brutal  fools.  Let  us  make  no  mistake  in 
this  matter.  India  without  a  religion  is  an  impossible 
conception.  India  with  her  present  religion  is  ceasing 
to  exist.  What  is  the  religion  we  have  to  give  her? 
and  how  far  can  the  Government,  without  departing 
from  its  traditional  attitude  of  impartial  overlord,  safe- 
guard her  from  false  religions  undermining  all  authority 
and  corrupting  every  fibre  of  the  moral  being? 

What  is  the  true  drama  of  Modern  India  ?  —  It  is  the 
collision  of  Christianity  and  Brahmanism,  the  conflict 
of  two  differing  souls,  the  struggle  between  a  spiritual 
materialism  and  a  material  spiritualism.  India,  with  her 
immemorial  antipathy  to  the  fierce  clangour  and  unsleep- 
ing energy  of  materialism,  is  feeling  in  every  vein  of  her 
body  the  beat  and  pulse  of  a  materialism  as  eager  and 
confident  and  elated  as  the  spirit  of  adventure;  and  this 
alien  materialism,  whatever  the  particular  forms  of  its 
religious  creed,  is  shot  and  saturated  in  all  the  warp  and 
woof  of  Its  being  with  the  morality  of  Christianity  and 


THE  CHILDREN  OF  INDIA  39 

the  spiritual  hauntings  of  Christ.  However  ugly  and 
however  selfish  and  brutal  it  may  seem,  the  materialism 
of  Europe  is  spiritual  in  its  attitude  towards  the  uni- 
verse, if  only  by  the  long  and  ineradicable  heredity  of 
Christian  influence.  It  cannot  out-think  its  centuries 
of  Christianity.  On  the  other  hand,  the  spiritualism  of 
India,  which  has  long  ago  departed  from  the  beautiful 
dreamings  and  baseless  metaphysics  of  the  Vedas,  is  the 
most  material  and  childishly  superstitious  animalism  that 
ever  masqueraded  as  idealism. 

In  the  shock  and  impact  of  these  two  souls,  the  soul 
of  Christianity  and  the  soul  of  Hinduism,  the  soul  of 
Europe  and  the  soul  of  Asia,  one  beholds  the  modern 
drama  of  India. 

To  understand  the  least  thing  about  India  you  must 
understand  the  religion  of  Hinduism.  And  truly  to  per- 
ceive the  immense  problem  of  the  future,  a  future  con- 
cerning all  the  world,  for  India  is  the  heart  of  the  East, 
you  must  study  the  subtle  and  leavening  effect  of  Chris- 
tianity upon  Hinduism,  of  Christian  materialism  upon 
pagan  spiritualism. 

Two  forces  are  wrestling  in  India  for  a  mastery  which 
must  ultimately  affect  all  mankind.  Outwardly,  the 
sense  of  conflict  is  not  apparent,  and  to  a  superficial  ob- 
server it  would  seem  that  India  is  pursuing  her  own  and 
ancient  road  utterly  oblivious  to  the  soul  of  Europe ;  but 
inwardly  there  is  being  waged  as  stern  and  fierce  a  con- 
test as  ever  heaved  the  world  to  this  side  and  to  that,  and 
it  is  not  the  bodies  of  nations  that  are  at  grips,  but  the 
soul  and  inward  mystery  of  humanity  —  the  spirit  of  the 
East  at  enmity  with  the  spirit  of  the  West,  and  the  soul 
of  Darkness  with  the  soul  of  Light. 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR 

One  of  the  greatest  delusions  of  modern  Europe  is  the 
hazy  notion,  born  of  Sir  Edwin  Arnold's  poetry,  Madame 
Blavatsky's  conjuring  tricks,  and  Mrs.  Besant's  whim- 
sical theosophy,  that  the  East  is  spiritually  superior  to 
the  West.  There  are  good  and  well-intentioned  people 
both  in  Europe  and  America  who  genuinely  believe  that 
the  religion  of  Christianity  is  actually  crude,  inferior, 
and  trivial  in  comparison  w^ith  some  mythical  and  en- 
tirely non-existent  religious  occultism  guarded  by  the 
mysterious  holy  men  of  India.  There  is  a  still  more 
numerous  host  among  the  white  races  which  holds  with 
a  most  sloven  and  treasonable  ignorance  which  it  re- 
gards as  a  pleasing  form  of  cosmopolitan  tolerance,  that 
Christianity  is  only  one  of  many  religions  all  very  much 
alike  and  all  more  or  less  similar  in  their  service  to 
humanity. 

The  truth  is  that  an  honest  man  who  travels  through 
India  even  with  the  most  casual  observation  and  the 
least  effort  to  discover  the  faCt  of  things,  finds  himself, 
must  find  himself,  again  and  again,  bowing  himself  in 
spirit  with  a  new  adoration  in  his  soul  and  a  fresh  un- 
derstanding in  his  mind,  before  the  majestic  beauty  and 
incomparable  sublimity  of  the  Divine  Christ.  If,  after 
my  long  journeys  through  India,  one  feeling  is  stronger 
in  my  mind  than  any  other,  if  one  illumination  burns 
in  my  soul  more  luminously   and  more  steadily  than 

40 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  41 

another,  if  one  conviction  is  paramount  and  sovran  above 
all  others,  it  is  that  Christ  stands  in  the  history  of  man- 
kind absolutely  alone  and  unchallengeably  supreme  as  the 
Light  of  the  World.  And  this  conviction  rests  not  only 
upon  the  sinless  life  and  exquisite  words  of  the  Master, 
nor  upon  the  civilizing  work  accomplished  by  Christian- 
ity in  Europe,  but  upon  the  realization  brought  home 
to  my  soul  by  the  condition  of  modern  India  as  to  the 
great  miracle  of  Christ's  personal  victory  over  the  Brah- 
manism  and  racial  superstitions  of  His  own  day. 

Exactly  what  the  Brahmans  are  to  modern  India,  the 
Scribes  and  Pharisees  were  to  Palestine.  And  while 
Christ  by  the  influence  of  His  character  and  the  magic 
of  His  Personality  easily  overthrew  those  Scribes  and 
Pharisees  and  sent  His  gracious  teaching  to  the  ends  of 
the  earth,  all  the  Missions  in  India,  protected  by  the 
dominant  power  and  supported  by  the  well-nigh  inex- 
haustible wealth  of  civilized  nations,  fling  themselves  in 
vain  against  this  rock  of  traditional  Brahmanism. 

It  is  well  that  the  truth  should  be  known.  Among  the 
educated  and  upper  classes  of  India,  Christianity  can 
claim  but  few  triumphs.  There  are  no  direct  conversions 
worth  speaking  about  except  among  the  lowest  and  the 
most  depressed  classes,  where  Christianity  is  moving  to 
amazing  victory.  The  indirect  effects  of  Christianity, 
presently  to  be  considered,  are  pervading  the  whole 
fabric  of  Indian  national  life  —  an  immense,  a  wonder- 
ful achievement  —  but  there  are  no  direct  effects  worth 
mention,  no  winning  of  disciples  and  no  real  catalogue 
of  conversions  among  the  Brahmans  and  the  castes 
immediately  sharing  in  the  power  and  plunder  of  Brah- 
manism.    Against    the    good    and    reforming    Buddha, 


42  OTHER  SHEEP 

Brahmanism  stood  firm;  the  little  body  of  Jains,  with 
their  quite  farcical  humanitarianism,  only  witness  to  the 
failure  of  yet  another  efifort  at  reformation.  Muham- 
adanism/  which  is  a  pure  and  lofty  religion  in  com- 
parison with  Hinduism,  has  had  no  cleansing  and  no 
uplifting  effect  upon  Brahmanism;  the  Parsi  worship  of 
nature  has  not  touched  the  outermost  fringe  of  Brah- 
manism ;  and,  after  centuries  of  missionary  labour,  Brah- 
manism remains  adamant  and  unconquered  before  the 
hosts  of  Christendom.  Brahmanism  is  now  apprehen- 
sive, is  even  angrily  alarmed  and  violently  afraid  of 
Christianity;  but  not  at  all  because  it  forsees  the  conver- 
sion of  India  —  only  because  it  dreads  the  indirect  effects 
of  Christianity  upon  caste  and  upon  its  own  tyrannical 
power  over  the  people. 

All  the  unrest  in  India  which  is  treacherous,  unscrupu- 
lous, and  bloody-handed  comes  from  the  Brahmans, 
and  its  inspiration  is  the  alarm  felt  by  Brahmanism  at 
the  increasing  conversions  to  Christianity  among  the  out- 
casts, and  the  extraordinary  progress  of  Christian  ideas 
among  the  Indian  peoples  in  general.  But  Brahmanism 
itself  is  utterly  untouched  by  the  spirit  of  Christ.  If 
it  is  moving  at  all  in  the  direction  of  Christianity,  it  is 
moving  under  the  cover  of  darkness  and  is  armed  with 
the  weapon  of  the  assassin.  Christianity,  and  not  Eng- 
land, is  the  supreme  enemy  of  Brahmanism,  as  Christ, 
and  not  Rome,  was  the  supreme  enemy  of  the  Scribes 
and  Pharisees. 

1  The  two  foundational  pillars  of  Muhamadanism  —  the  worship 
of  One  God,  and  the  abomination  of  idolatry  —  offer  an  invitation  to 
Christianity  which  will  surely  one  day  lead  to  great  events.  But  this 
is  a  subject  to  be  considered  elsewhere. 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  43 

It  is  well  that  the  reader  should  acquaint  himself  with 
the  true  nature  of  Hinduism,  and  see  exactly  what  it 
is  that  Brahmanism  sets  itself  to  guard.  Let  him  banish 
from  his  mind  any  idea  that  there  is  something  mys- 
terious and  wonderful  in  the  Eastern  religion.  Let  him 
rest  assured  that  the  Indian  theosophy  which  makes  con- 
verts of  queer  people  in  Europe  and  America,  is  some- 
thing of  which  99,999  persons  out  of  every  100,000  in 
India  would  not  understand  a  single  word.  And  let 
him  know  for  a  certainty  that  all  the  magic  and  marvels 
of  Madame  Blavatsky  were  revealed  by  the  Society  for 
Psychical  Research,  which  sent  a  trained  inquirer  to 
India,  as  tricks  and  cheatings  of  a  very  trivial  character. 

What,  in  sober  truth,  is  the  chief  religion  of  India, 
know^n  under  the  including  name  of  Hinduism?  Sir 
Monier  Williams  has  put  it  in  a  single  phrase  —  it  is  a 
mental  disease.  "  The  great  majority  of  the  inhabitants 
of  India,"  he  says,  "  are  from  the  cradle  to  the  burning 
ground,  victims  of  a  form  of  mental  disease  which 
is  best  expressed  by  the  term  demonophobia.  They  are 
haunted  and  oppressed  by  a  perpetual  dread  of  demons. 
They  are  firmly  convinced  that  evil  spirits  of  all  kinds, 
from  malignant  fiends  to  merely  mischievous  imps  and 
elves,  are  ever  on  the  watch  to  harm,  harass,  and  tor- 
ment them,  to  cause  plague,  sickness,  famine  and  dis- 
aster, to  impede,  injure,  and  mar  every  good  work." 

Terror  is  the  spirit  of  Hinduism.  Fear  is  the  tyrant 
of  the  Hindu.  His  humanitarianism,  with  which  Eu- 
rope is  often  reproached  by  vegetarian  theosophists,  has 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  kindness  towards  animals, 
but  is  entirely  inspired  b}^  fear  of  offending  some  god 
or  demon,  or  of  destroying  the  reincarnating  soul  of  a 


44  OTHER  SHEEP 

hero  or  a  friend.  Always  he  is  afraid.  I  have  talked  to 
devil-dancers,  to  low-caste  and  to  high-caste  Hindus 
throughout  India,  and  in  all  cases  I  have  found  that 
fundamental  in  their  mind  to  every  concept  of  the  uni- 
verse and  every  apprehension  of  the  spirit  world,  is  a 
vital  and  ineradicable  terror.  Convert  a  devil-dancer, 
make  him  quite  sure  that  God  is  Love  and  that  Christ 
has  saved  him  from  perdition,  and  still  you  will  find 
him  haunted  by  the  fear  that  Satan  is  never  absent  from 
his  side  waiting  to  seize  and  destroy  him  on  the  smallest 
opportunity.  That  is  ever  his  master-thought.  Always 
to  the  Hindu  there  is  a  giant  menace  overspreading  the 
firmament  and  darkening  the  earth  with  the  shadow  of 
an  implacable  hostility.  It  is  far  easier  for  him  to  con- 
ceive of  three  hundred  million  wicked  gods,  than  to  be- 
lieve in  one  God  absolutely  pure,  absolutely  kind,  and 
absolutely  good.  His  experience  of  life  justifies  the  one 
theory  and  denies  the  other.  Existence  for  him  is  not 
the  gift  of  a  loving  Father,  but  a  cruel  and  hazardous 
martyrdom  created  by  malignant  devils.  Pain  and  dis- 
ease strike  at  him  from  the  air  and  from  the  ground; 
famine  descends  upon  his  laboured  fields  with  a  blast  of 
destroying  hate ;  he  cries  to  the  gods  for  rain  —  and 
the  only  answer  to  his  cry  is  an  earth  of  iron  and  a  sky 
of  brass;  in  the  midst  of  rains  that  beat  his  crops  to 
earth,  he  beseeches  demon  or  god  for  mercy,  and  the 
answer  comes  in  a  flood  that  sweeps  away  his  hut  and 
drowns  his  cattle;  never  for  him  is  life  a  gift  of  love 
shining  with  the  testimony  of  divine  beneficence. 

"  Why  do  you  pray  to  a  devil  ?  "  I  asked  a  venerable 
Hindu  in  Southern  India.  "  Sahib,"  he  replied,  ''  why 
should  1  pray  to  a  God  who  is  good  ?  " 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  45 

It  is  with  them  the  clearest  logic  in  the  world  that 
prayer  to  a  benign  and  loving  Heaven-Father  must  either 
be  superfluous  or  of  the  nature  of  insult;  whereas,  surely 
it  is  most  just  and  reasonable  that  poor  and  defenceless 
humanity  should  kneel  and  humble  itself  before  those 
black  and  awful  powers  which  afflict  it  with  a  chastise- 
ment utterly  unthinkable  from  a  God  of  Love. 

Here  lies  the  mightiest  blunder  of  Christian  mission- 
aries. To  a  people  in  whom  this  conviction  is  fixed  and 
steadfast,  they  have  presented  the  idea  of  a  good  God 
who  is  the  author  of  all  their  mischief,  and  whose  mercy 
can  only  be  procured  by  abasement  and  supplication. 
They  have  not  taught  —  of  course,  I  speak  generally 
—  that  suffering  is  largely  the  merciful  process  of  edu- 
cation following  the  infringement  of  natural  laws  set 
in  motion  for  the  good  and  profit  of  mankind;  nor  that 
prayer  is  an  aspiration  of  the  immortal  soul  seeking 
communion  with  its  Maker,  not  a  request  for  benefits 
and  advantages.  They  have  attempted  to  teach  the  In- 
dian what  it  is  impossible  for  a  rational  man  to  believe 
or  for  an  honest  man  to  prove  —  that  a  Creator  who  is 
perfect  goodness  and  perfect  love  requires  to  be  moved 
by  prayer  before  He  will  act  with  ordinary  kindness 
towards  His  creatures;  and  that  prayer  to  such  a  God, 
faithfully  prayed,  will  do  away  with  all  the  distresses 
of  humanity.  And  the  Indian,  listening  to  such  a  mis- 
sionary, sees  stronger  and  hardier  men  of  the  white  race 
building  canals  against  famine,  draining  the  land  against 
flood,  and  using  the  science  of  medicine  against  plague 
and  fever  —  not  praying  to  their  good  God  for  the  pre- 
vention of  these  calamities.  What  does  he  conclude? 
If  prayer  will  suffice,  why  all  this  labour  and  activity? 


46  OTHER  SHEEP 

And  if  labour  and  activity  are  necessary,  why  pray? 
To  him  it  seems  infinitely  simpler  and  obviously  more 
logical  to  follov^  the  long  tradition  of  his  fathers  —  to 
placate  by  every  means  in  his  power  the  evil  forces  in 
the  universe,  and  certainly  to  risk  no  fear  of  displeasing 
the  good  gods  by  presuming  to  tell  them  what  they 
should  do  with  the  world. 

A  reasonable  and  explicating  Theism,  the  true  Theism 
of  a  true  Christianity,  is  not  only  opposed  by  a  super- 
stitious and  traditional  Hinduism,  but  also  by  the  misrep- 
resentations of  Christianity  deep-rooted  in  the  Indian 
mind  by  the  unconscious  blasphemies  of  Deism.  The 
Indian  still  thinks  that  our  religion  implies  a  God  who 
made  the  world  and  blundered  it:  who,  having  made  it, 
repented  of  His  work  and  left  the  Devil  to  do  with  it 
what  he  would :  and  who  afterwards  incarnated  Himself 
for  a  few  years  and  failed  to  overcome  the  power  of 
His  adversary.  It  is  most  difficult  to  make  the  average 
Indian  mind  conceive  of  a  God  now  and  always  associ- 
ated with  humanity,  a  Creator  who  is  still  creating,  a 
Light  that  is  still  shining,  and  an  Energy  that  is  still 
redeeming  and  uplifting. 

A  young  Hindu  educated  at  Oxford  said  to  me  on  this 
subject  — "  If  the  missionaries  had  talked  to  us  more 
of  salvation  and  less  of  damnation,  Christianity  would 
have  made  real  progress  among  our  educated  people  long 
before  now." 

Think  what  it  must  be  for  these  people,  schooled  to 
believe  that  suffering  proceeds  from  a  wicked  and  hostile 
force,  to  be  told  that  a  good  God  is  the  author  of  their 
damnation. 

This  is  really  what  the  teaching  of  the  missionaries 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  47 

—  a  teaching,  of  course,  absolutely  at  variance  with  the 
goodness  of  Christianity  —  has  implanted  in  the  Indian 
mind.  They  have  not  said,  *'  If  you  believe  you  will  be 
saved,"  but,  "  If  you  do  not  believe  you  will  be  damned.'* 
Their  God  is  the  Hindu's  Devil. 

Different,  vastly  different,  is  the  method  of  Fakir 
Singh;  and  to  the  hopeful  and  persuasive  tone  of  its 
teaching  as  much  as  to  the  earnestness,  humility,  and 
native  simplicity  of  its  teachers,  I  attribute  the  extraor- 
dinary success  of  the  Salvation  Army  in  India.  Here, 
as  showing  the  true  method  of  Christian  propaganda,  I 
will  describe  a  colloquy  of  Fakir  Singh  with  one  of  the 
many  Nicodemuses  among  the  modern  Indians. 

Picture  to  yourself  the  scene.  Under  a  tree,  close  to  a 
well  where  women  are  drawing  water  and  labourers  are 
driving  their  oxen  to  the  trough,  sits  the  Salvationist 
in  native  dress  talking  to  a  little  company  of  turbaned 
figures  about  the  Good  Shepherd  and  the  way  of  libera- 
tion. The  sun  sets  behind  a  grove  of  palm-trees,  the 
strange  scent  of  an  Eastern  night  begins  to  breathe 
from  the  warm  dust,  the  soft  sky  grows  gradually  per- 
vaded with  pale  and  trembling  stars,  out  of  the  distant 
jungle,  lifting  its  tall  trees  and  spreading  bushes  to  the 
violet  hills,  come  the  vespers  of  birds,  the  ravening  cry 
of  beasts  of  prey,  and  the  sigh  of  night.  The  last  woman 
leaves  the  well  with  a  brazen  vessel  balanced  on  her  head 
and  another  steadied  against  her  hip.  The  labourers 
are  driving  their  cattle  back  to  the  shelter  of  the  village. 
A  shadow  falls  between  heaven  and  the  earth.  A  cres- 
cent moon  appears  above  a  cluster  of  bamboos.  The 
little  company  of  turbaned  figures  rises  from  the  ground, 
and  with  homely  courtesy  and  a  genuine  kindness  of 


48  OTHER  SHEEP 

heart,  each  man  salaams  to  the  Fakir.     One  remains  be- 
hind. 

"  Guru,"  he  says,  when  the  others  have  passed  out  of 
hearing,  "  I  am  a  man  who  does  harm  to  no  one,  and 
good  to  those  w^ho  are  in  sorrow  or  distress;  do  I  need 
your  Christ  to  save  me  from  damnation  ?  " 

"  How  is  that  possible?  "  answers  the  Fakir.  ''  Christ 
did  not  come  to  call  the  righteous,  but  sinners  to  re- 
pentance." 

"Ah!  that  is  what  one  can  understand." 

"  He  came  to  heal  those  who  have  no  physician." 

"  That  is  what  I  wanted  to  hear." 

"  He  is  a  seeker  of  lost  sheep.  Those  who  have  a  shep- 
herd do  not  require  Him." 

"  Then,  as  I  am  a  good  man,  and  as  I  need  no  physi- 
cian, and  as  I  have  a  shepherd  in  my  own  religion,  why 
should  you  tell  me  about  Christ  ?  " 

"  In  case  you  are  not  quite  certain  that  you  are  good, 
and  that  you  need  no  physician." 

"  Well,  no  man  is  perfectly  good." 

"  That  is  true,  O  brother." 

"  A  man  is  a  man ;  he  is  prone  to  evil." 

"  You  have  wisdom." 

"  But,  tell  me,  what  do  you  mean  by  sin  ?  " 

"  I  mean  the  knowledge  of  the  heart  that  it  is  un- 
happy and  disquieted ;  the  feeling  of  the  soul  that  it  is  not 
at  peace  with  God;  the  thought,  O  my  brother,  the 
thought  of  the  conscience  that  death  may  have  a  fear 
and  a  hazard  for  the  spirit." 

"  Well,  but  if  a  man  follows  his  religion?  " 

"  That  is  not  enough.  Nay !  that  is  surely  not 
enough." 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  49 

"  Guru,  he  does  the  best  he  can." 

"  But  it  does  not  give  him  peace." 

"  Yes,  but  how  should  he  know  that  another  religion 
will  give  him  peace?  That  is  the  heart  of  this  business! 
How  should  he  know  ?  " 

"  Brother,  he  must  try  for  himself.  If  you  are  ill, 
and  you  send  for  a  doctor  who  makes  you  no  better, 
do  you  not  send  for  another,  and  yet  another,  until 
you  discover  one  whose  medicine  gives  you  strength 
and  whose  care  restores  you  to  the  joy  of  health? 
Brother,  the  soul  is  sick  as  well  as  the  body;  there  are 
soul  doctors  as  well  as  body  doctors.  My  religion  says 
that  it  can  take  away  the  unrest  of  the  heart  and  give 
peace  to  the  soul  —  the  peace  of  God  which  passes  all 
understanding.  Does  your  religion  make  such  a  prom- 
ise? If  it  does,  and  if  after  long  trial  you  have  found 
that  your  heart  is  still  disquieted  and  your  soul  is  yet 
full  of  unrest,  is  it  not  wise,  for  the  peace  of  your  own 
heart  and  for  the  health  of  your  own  soul,  that  you 
should  make  trial  of  another  religion  ?  I  do  not  ask  you 
to  try  my  religion  if  your  heart  is  at  peace  with  God  and 
you  can  contemplate  the  hour  of  your  death  without  dis- 
may. But  if  your  heart  is  unhappy  with  a  sense  of  guilt, 
if  your  conscience  will  not  let  you  rest,  and  if  your  soul 
is  afraid  of  death,  then  I  invite  you  to  make  trial  of  my 
religion.  And  I  ask  you,  because  I,  too,  was  unhappy 
and  full  of  unrest  until  I  bowed  myself  before  the  Light 
of  the  World  and  followed  the  Way,  the  Truth,  and  the 
Life." 

In  every  religion  of  the  East  there  is  a  door  always 
standing  open  through  which  the  true  disciple  of  the 
Way  can  enter  and  win  companions  for  his  soul.     It  is 


<^^ 


50  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  door  of  the  human  heart.  Troubled  and  unhappy  is 
the  heart  of  India.  The  banks  of  the  sacred  rivers  are 
thick  with  pilgrims  seeking  peace  of  mind  and  rest  of 
soul.  The  shrines  are  congregated  with  human  weari- 
ness and  spiritual  disquiet.  The  relics  of  saints  are  rev- 
erenced and  besought  for  a  peace  of  heart  wistfully 
desired.  For  a  surety  of  soul  dimly  imagined,  the 
temples  are  filled  with  kneelers  and  the  worn  rosaries 
turned  in  ceaseless  prayer.  The  religions  of  the  East 
endure  because  they  have  failed. 

To  go  as  a  theologian  to  these  hungering  and  thirst- 

i^ « V  e  i"g  millions  and  to  dogmatize  about  the  origin  of  evil 

lejif.  and  the  nature  of  Christ,  is  but  to  anger  and  confuse 

^•V.  them.     They  are  seekers  of  peace.     It  is  not  a  definition 

that  they  desire,  but  rest  of  heart  and  quiet  of  soul. 

They  need,  not  a  pedagogue,  but  a  physician:  a  good 

shepherd,  not  a  casuist. 

The  supreme  weakness  of  Hinduism  is  its  utter 
incapacity  to  satisfy  the  human  heart.  And  this  impo- 
tence arises  from  the  absence  of  a  moral  code.  Christi- 
anity insists  upon  a  cleansed  heart.  Hinduism  asks  only 
for  a  surrender  of  the  reason.  Hinduism  attributes  all 
the  ills  of  humanity  to  the  circumference  of  the  uni- 
verse. Christianity  points  to  the  human  centre,  the 
heart  of  man.  The  Hindu  gods  are  wicked  and  abomi- 
nable, prostitution  is  a  means  of  financing  many  of  the 
temples,  a  man  may  consider  himself  a  good  and  pious 
disciple  of  his  faith  who  lies,  steals,  and  violates  the  law 
of  sex  —  there  is  no  insistence  whatever  on  the  supreme 
need  for  a  cleansed  heart.  "  He  who  pronounces 
Durga,"  says  one  authority,  "though  he  constantly 
practises  adultery,  plunders  others  of  their  property,  or 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  51 

commits  the  most  heinous  crimes,  is  freed  from  all 
sins."  Indeed,  sin,  in  the  true  sense,  scarcely  exists  in 
the  conception  of  Hinduism.  Ask  a  man  how  it  is  that 
he  worships  as  a  god  one  who  is  immoral  and  iniquitous 
and  he  will  reply,  with  a  smile  for  your  ignorance,  that 
surely  a  god  may  do  what  he  likes.  Samarthi  ko  dosh 
nahin  —  the  Mighty  may  do  what  they  please.  "  The 
duties  of  life/'  says  Bishop  Caldwell,  "  ar€  never  incul- 
cated in  any  Hindu  temple.  The  discharge  of  those 
duties  is  never  represented  as  enjoined  by  the  gods,  nor 
are  any  prayers  ever  offered  in  any  temple  for  help  to 
enable  the  worshippers  to  discharge  those  duties 
aright.  .  .  .  We  meet  with  a  moral  Hindu  who  has 
broken  altogether  away  from  religion;  and  what  is  still 
more  common,  yet  still  more  extraordinary,  we  meet 
with  a  devout  Hindu  who  lives  a  flagrantly  immoral 
life.  In  the  latter  case,  no  person  sees  any  inconsist- 
ency between  the  immorality  and  the  devoutness."  It 
is  absolute  truth  that  spirituality  in  their  imagination  is 
a  state  of  being  in  which  a  man  may  do  whatever  he 
pleases  without  the  fear  of  any  evil  consequences.  For 
a  man  who  can  say  '^^  Aham  Brahma  —  I  am  God,"  there 
exists  neither  good  nor  evil.  Sin,  which  Christianity 
declares  to  be  the  source  of  all  disquiet  and  unrest,  for 
Hinduism  is  only  a  serious  matter  where  it  exists  as  part 
of  a  general  attachment  to  earth  life  jn  the  heart  of  a 
man  not  yet  covetous  of  annihilation.  The  peace  sought 
by  India  is  the  peace  of  non-existence. 

In  a  few  sentences  it  is  possible  to  express  quite  truth- 
fully and  without  any  danger  of  omission  or  misrepre- 
sentation the  religion  of  the  vast  majority  of  the  Hindu 
peoples.     They  believe  that  life  must  always  be  accom- 


52  OTHER  SHEEP 

panied  by  misery:  that  deliverance  from  individual  ex- 
istence can  only  be  attained  by  the  cessation  of  all 
desires  —  good  or  bad :  that  man  is  surrounded  by 
malignant  forces  hostile  to  his  happiness:  and  that  the 
gods  and  goddesses,  who  are  altogether  indifferent  to 
Conduct,  are  to  be  cajoled  and  even  threatened  into 
affording  protection  or  bestowing  material  prosperity. 

The  first  object  of  a  Hindu's  life  is  to  beget  sons,  in 
order  that  his  journey  through  hell,  after  the  miseries 
of  this  earthly  life,  may  be  shortened  by  the  sacrifices  of 
male  heirs.  Until  he  is  the  father  of  sons,  the  Hindu 
considers  that  he  walks  the  earth  in  the  very  greatest 
peril  of  soul.  So  soon  as  he  can  boast  of  sons 
(daughters  are  of  no  avail  in  the  business),  he  can  take 
his  religion  more  easily,  and  propitiatory  sacrifices  to  the 
gods  are  varied  among  the  low  castes  by  thrashings  and 
spittings  and  curses  when  these  idols  fail  to  avert  dis- 
aster or  prosper  an  undertaking.  Nevertheless,  the 
Hindu  is  alwayfe  in  a  state  of  some  uncertainty  about  his 
soul,  not  on  account  of  his  sins,  but  because  he  fears 
reincarnations  of  pain  and  horror,  and  stands  in  awe  of 
gods  as  capricious  and  vague  in  their  requirements  of 
humanity  as  they  are  cruel,  revengeful  and  iniquitous. 
Hinduism  is  a  weltering  chaos  of  terror,  darkness,  and 
uncertainty.  It  is  a  religion  without  the  apprehension  of 
a  moral  evolution,  without  definite  commandments,  and 
without  a  God. 

I  have  asked  many  of  the  humblest  Indians  in  various 
parts  of  the  country  what  they  understand  by  evil,  and 
the  answer  was  always  the  same.  Evil  consists  in  con- 
duct punished  by  the  Government.  They  acknowledge 
the  difference  between  right  and  wrong,  but  it  is  impos- 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  53 

sible  to  make  them  realize  anything  approaching  to  the 
nature  of  a  rehgious  sanction  in  the  sphere  of  morals. 
For  them  religion  is  mainly  a  life-long  effort  to  placate 
the  demons  who  afflict  them,  and  —  among  the  more 
spiritual  —  an  agony  of  soul  to  reach  that  dehumanized 
condition  of  mind  in  which  the  desire  for  annihilation  is 
supreme.  "  They  eat  religiously,  drink  religiously,  bathe 
religiously,  dress  religiously,  and  sin  religiously." 

There  is  hardly  one  representation  of  the  Hindu  gods 
(who,  by  the  way,  are  scarcely  ever  black,  but  white  like 
Europeans)  that  is  not  ugly  and  repulsive  to  a  degree 
almost  incredible.  You  see  pictures  and  idols  of  these 
gods  which  suggest  the  grotesque  figures  in  a  panto- 
mime. One  god  has  the  head  of  an  elephant;  another 
the  head  of  a  monkey  —  and  so  on.  "The  shape  and 
operations  of  divine  and  semi-divine  beings,"  says  Sir 
Monier  Williams,  "  are  generally  suggestive  of  the  mon- 
strous, the  frightful,  the  hideous,  and  the  incredible,  the 
deeds  of  its  heroes,  who  are  themselves  half-gods,  trans- 
port the  imagination  into  the  region  of  the  wildest 
chimera;  and  a  whole  pantheon  presents  itself,  teeming 
with  grotesque  and  unwieldy  symbols,  with  horrible  cre- 
ations, half -animals,  half -gods,  with  man-eating  ogres, 
many-headed  giants  and  disgusting  demons."  ^ 

The  stories  concerning  these  gods  and  goddesses  are 
not  only  contemptible  and  ridiculous,  they  are  so  fright- 
fully obscene  and  so  abominably  filthy  that  they  cannot 
even  be  obscurely  hinted  or  vaguely  adumbrated  in  Eng- 
lish print.  "  The  stories  related  of  Krishna's  life,"  says 
one  authority,  "  do  more  than  anything  else  to  destroy 
the  morals  and  corrupt  the  imagination  of  Hindu  youth." 
1  See  page  352. 


54  OTHER  SHEEP 

The  generous  people  who  take  that  easy  view  of 
idolatry  made  popular  by  Carlyle's  bludgeoning  rhetoric, 
would  find  themselves  forced  to  other  opinions  if  they 
lived  in  the  house  of  a  Hindu  and  witnessed  the  con- 
tinual and  painful  service  rendered  to  these  absurd  effi- 
gies of  brass  or  clay.  An  Indian  himself  has  shown  the 
folly  of  the  thesis  that  an  idol  is  an  instrument  for  elevat- 
ing the  mind  to  a  realization  of  an  invisible  god.  *'  For 
whatever  Hindu  purchases  an  idol  in  the  market,  or  con- 
structs one  with  his  own  hands,  or  has  one  made  under 
his  own  superintendence,  it  is  his  invariable  practice  to 
perform  certain  ceremonies,  called  Pran  Pratishtha,  or 
the  endowment  of  animation,  by  which  he  believes  that 
its  nature  is  changed  from  that  of  the  mere  materials  of 
which  it  is  formed,  and  that  it  acquires  not  only  life  but 
supernatural  powers.  Shortly  afterwards,  if  the  idol  be 
of  the  masculine  gender,  he  marries  it  to  a  feminine  one : 
with  no  less  pomp  and  magnificence  than  he  celebrates 
the  nuptials  of  his  own  children.  The  mysterious  pro- 
cess is  now  complete;  and  the  god  and  goddess  are 
esteemed  the  arbiters  of  his  destiny,  and  continually  re- 
ceive his  most  ardent  adoration."  ^ 

It  is  a  truth,  as  another  writer  points  out,  that  this 
idolatry  is  much  the  same  as  a  child's  play  with  its  dolls. 
"  Little  children  talk  to  their  dolls  as  if  they  had  life. 
They  dress  them,  pretend  to  give  them  food,  put  them 
to  sleep,  and  so  forth.  Grown-up  people  do  the  same. 
They  treat  their  idols  as  living  beings.  They  offer  them 
food,  though  they  cannot  eat;  they  have  different  kinds 
of  music  before  idols  that  cannot  hear;  they  wave  lights 

1  In  this  rite  one  seems  to  perceive  the  dim  origin  of  a  later 
doctrine  called  Transubstantiation. 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  55 

before  what  cannot  see.  In  the  cold  season  they  furnish 
them  with  warm  clothes;  in  the  hot  season  they  fan  them; 
and  lest  mosquitoes  should  bite  them,  they  place  them 
within  curtains  at  night." 

This  is  the  religion  of  by  far  the  greatest  number  of 
India's  inhabitants.  If  the  reader  has  any  doubt  in  his 
mind  as  to  the  faithfulness  of  my  summary,  let  him 
obtain  a  copy  of  Popular  Hinduism^  published  by  the 
Christian  Literature  Society  for  India,  which  contains 
authoritative  quotations  not  only  from  such  European 
scholars  as  Max  Miiller,  Monier  Williams,  and  Alfred 
Lyall,  but  from  the  writings  of  converted  Hindus  and 
the  sacred  books  of  Hinduism  itself.  A  perusal  of  this 
little  volume,  saving  the  labour  and  distress  of  a  pro- 
founder  study  which  is  really  not  worth  a  serious  man's 
while,  will  bring  an  overwhelming  conviction  to  the  mind 
of  any  just  person  that  Hinduism,  root  and  branch,  is  the 
absurdest  superstition  imaginable,  that  it  has  its  rise  in 
a  savage  animalism,  and  contains  absolutely  nothing 
which  can  be  of  the  very  smallest  service  to  the  evolution 
of  humanity. 

What  I  have  written  will  lead  the  reader,  I  hope,  to 
perceive  that  the  true  attitude  for  Europe  towards  India 
is  that  of  the  adult  towards  the  child.  It  would  be  un- 
just to  view  the  immoralities  of  the  Hindus  with  the 
same  measure  of  indignation  meet  and  necessary  in  the 
case  of  a  European.  One  must  feel  pity  for  a  people  so 
kindly,  so  docile  and  so  simple  who  are  so  blind  to  uni- 
versal truth  and  so  marvellously  obedient  to  authority. 
They  are  as  children  frightened  by  darkness  and  haunted 
by  the  ghost  stories  of  their  parents.  It  is  not  with  them 
as  with  certain  schools  of  religion  in  Europe,  that  their 


56  OTHER  SHEEP 

superstition  is  an  affectation  and  their  ritualism  a  pose  in 
aestheticism.  They  are  terribly  in  earnest.  It  is  neces- 
sary always  to  remind  oneself  that  these  toiling  and 
obedient  millions  are  as  childlike  in  reason  and  intuition, 
and  as  real  and  earnest  in  their  childishness,  as  the  Chil- 
dren of  Israel. 

This,  then,  is  the  religion  which  Brahmanism  sets 
itself  to  guard.  And  the  object  of  Brahmanism's 
solicitude  is  not  the  religion  itself,  but  the  paralysing  and 
emasculating  effect  of  that  religion  on  the  peoples  whose 
submissiveness  is  essential  to  its  own  power.-^  Brahman- 
ism, which  can  still  order  an  educated  man  who  has 
broken  caste  to  take  into  his  mouth  the  five  products  of 
the  cow,  which  can  still  make  a  Rajah  go  barefoot  in 
penance  to  the  sea  while  itself  rides  triumphantly  in  a 
palanquin,  which  can  still  keep  seventy  million  people  in 
a  condition  of  absolute  helotry,  is  such  a  power  in  priest- 
craft as  nothing  in  the  history  of  ancient  times  or  the 
mediaeval  chronicles  of  the  Latin  Church  can  even 
faintly  parallel.  And  against  this  mighty  and  utterly 
unscrupulous  force,  standing  guard  over  the  Hindu 
temple  of  terror  and  holding  in  its  hand  the  scourge  of 
earthly  chastisement  and  the  flaming  keys  of  hell,  the 
soul  of  European  democracy  is  now  going  up  in  many 
forms  w^hich  strike  terror  to  its  heart,  but  in  none  so 
menacing  to  its  power  and  so  threatening  to  its  peace, 
as  in  the  form  of  the  meek  and  lowly  Christ  with  His 
gospel  of  the  cleansed  heart  and  His  promise  of  libera- 
tion from  the  sense  of  sin. 

Christianity,  I  beg  you  to  believe,  is  the  supreme 
enemy  of  Brahmanism.  The  victory  of  Christ  in  India 
1  See  page  352. 


THE  TEMPLE  OF  TERROR  57 

is  the  victory  of  enlightenment  as  well  as  of  elevation, 
of  freedom  as  well  as  of  virtue,  of  joy,  courage,  and 
hope,  as  well  as  the  victory  of  moral  grandeur. 

If  you  would  know  the  full  difference  between  Brah- 
manism  and  Christianity  consider  that  Brahmanism  in 
many  parts  of  India  takes  into  its  temples  little  girls  of 
ten  and  twelve  years  of  age;  that  with  pomp  and  cere- 
mony it  marries  these  poor  children  to  a  god;  that  the 
children  are  kept  in  the  temple  to  sing  and  dance  before 
satyr-inspired  worshippers ;  that  the  money  paid  for  their 
moral  corruption  by  these  worshippers  goes  to  the  priests ; 
and  that  as  soon  as  they  reach  an  age  which  is  considered 
unprofitable,  they  are  turned  out  into  a  strange  and 
friendless  world  to  become  the  slave-women  of  any  pimp 
or  pandar  of  the  bazaar.^ 

In  the  following  chapters  I  hope  to  give  the  reader 
from  the  diary  of  my  travels  and  the  chronicles  of  my 
conversations  with  Indians,  as  well  as  a  graphic  picture 
of  Indian  life,  a  clearer  and  more  human  idea  of  the  dif- 
ference between  Christianity  and  Hinduism.  But  this 
present  chapter  will  surely  suffice  to  rid  the  mind  of  Euro- 
peans corrupted  by  theosophical  moonings  and  mystical 
sentimentalism  of  the  monstrous  delusion  that  there  is 
anything  in  Hinduism  which  can  be  of  the  smallest  serv- 
ice to  humanity,  or  that  it  has  achieved  anything  in  the 
long  course  of  its  history  except  the  debasement,  the 
degradation,  and  the  defilement  of  human  nature. 

Aryan  philosophers  have  uttered  beautiful  ideas,  Dra- 
vidian  poets  have  composed  mellifluous  verses,  thoughts 
gracious  and  pleasing  are  woven  here  and  there   like 

1  This  well-known  state  of  affairs  is  fully  described  in  a  book 
entitled,  Things  as  they  are  in  Southern  India. 


58  OTHER  SHEEP 

golden  threads  into  the  immense  and  sombre  fabric  of 
Indian  Hterature ;  but  Hinduism,  the  religion  of  the  ruck, 
in  the  long  course  of  its  development  has  contributed 
neither  glory  to  history  nor  honour  to  humanity,  man's 
knowledge  of  the  universe  ov/es  it  not  a  farthing  of  debt, 
freedom  is  contemptuous  of  it,  and  conduct  can  accuse  it 
justly  of  a  thousand  crimes.^ 

1  See  page  352. 


TWO  PANDALS 

Accompanied  by  a  friend  and  fellow-traveller,  I  set  out 
soon  after  landing  in  Bombay  for  the  South  of  India, 
where  I  was  to  meet  Fakir  Singh,  see  parts  of  the  country 
seldom  visited  by  the  tourist,  and  make  acquaintance  with 
a  subject  which  has  always  had  a  curious  interest  for  m)^ 
mind  —  humanity's  worship  of  evil  as  represented  by 
devil-dancing  and  other  perversions  of  the  religious  con- 
science. 

To  reach  Trivandrum,  chief  city  of  Travancore,  an  in- 
dependent state  in  Southern  India,  we  journeyed  by  train 
to  Quilon,  climbing  into  the  tall  mountains  where  ele- 
phants, tigers,  sambur,  and  other  creatures  of  the  jungle 
range  through  a  forest  of  dense  and  far-spreading 
beauty.  We  descended  in  many  sweeping  circles, 
through  the  rich  splendours  of  sunset,  to  sea-level  on  the 
other  side,  and  thus  on  to  the  end  of  the  railway  journey. 
It  was  eight  o'clock  in  the  evening  when  our  train  stopped 
at  Quilon.  The  platform  of  the  station  was  thronged  by 
a  multitude  of  half-naked,  chocolate-coloured  natives. 
Through  this  loud-chattering  mass  of  people  we  made  our 
way  to  the  refreshment  room,  ate  our  dinner,  and  a  few 
minutes  before  nine  set  out  to  walk  through  the  town  of 
Quilon  to  the  boats  which  were  to  carry  us  through  the 
night  on  the  backwaters  of  Travancore  to  the  capital  city 
of  Trivandrum. 

The  moon  was  shining  above  the  palm-trees,  and  ex- 

59 


6o  OTHER  SHEEP 

cept  for  the  circle  dazzled  by  her  radiance,  the  sky  was 
studded  with  stars  which  burned,  twinkled,  and  glittered 
with  an  indescribable  magnificence.  The  dark,  myste- 
rious, and  tree-shaded  streets  of  Quilon  were  crowded 
with  barefoot  natives  who  passed  us  by  as  silently  as 
ghosts  or  approached  us  out  of  the  shadows  with  the 
suddenness  of  apparitions.  The  houses  in  the  streets 
showed  no  lights  till  we  reached  the  market,  where  a  row 
of  stalls  glowed  with  a  soft  yellow  brightness  and  a  little 
pandal,  an  open  erection  of  bamboo  and  leaves,  set  up  for 
the  celebration  of  a  Muhamadan  festival  called  Mohur- 
rum,  occupied  a  garish  corner  and  shone  with  all  the 
momentary  and  tinsel  vivacity  of  an  English  fair.  For 
a  few  moments  we  were  surrounded  by  a  gaping  mob  who 
eyed  us  with  consuming  interest,  and  whispered  among 
themselves  as  to  this  sudden  appearance  of  two  English- 
men in  their  midst.  A  couple  of  rickshaws  followed  us 
into  the  gloom  of  the  trees,  the  men  in  the  shafts  sound- 
ing their  spring  bells  and  inviting  us  to  ride. 

We  came  presently  to  the  backwaters.  Steps  dug  in 
the  banks  led  us  down  to  the  Indian  country  passage- 
boats,  called  vullums.  These  strange  vessels  resemble  the 
gondola  of  Venice,  but  without  the  tourist  note.  They 
are  long  and  narrow,  with  a  slightly  raised  prow,  carved 
into  some  unintelligible  design.  The  timbers  are  not 
nailed  together,  but  sewn  with  cohair  and  made  water- 
tight with  fish-oil.  The  middle  is  roofed  with  palm  leaves 
laced  and  woven  into  a  rounded  framework  of  bamboo. 
Part  of  this  roof  is  movable,  and  can  be  pushed  back  to 
leave  an  open  space  in  the  centre.  The  floor  is  covered 
with  matting,  on  which  a  bed  can  be  made  at  either  end. 
The  crew,  for  a  long  journey,  consists  of  four  natives, 


TWO  PANDALS  6i 

two  in  the  bows,  and  two  in  the  stern.  They  shove  the 
boats  along  with  bamboo  poles  in  shallow  water,  and  row 
it  with  long  oars  ending  in  a  small  spoon-shaped  blade 
when  they  enter  the  lakes.  At  intervals  they  are  relieved 
by  fresh  men  from  the  scattered  villages  along  the  banks. 
These  men  are  good-looking,  chocolate-coloured,  black- 
haired  people,  having  abrupt  features,  a  protruding  lower 
lip,  fine  eyes,  and  bodies  as  thin  and  wiry  as  a  vigorous 
English  boy. 

I  am  still  haunted  by  the  memory  of  that  night  journey 
through  the  backwaters  of  Travancore.  Although  the 
sea  was  almost  wnthin  a  stone's-throw,  and  although  the 
backwaters  are  tidal  and  salt,  there  was  no  sense  of  the 
ocean  in  the  air,  no  sound  of  its  unrest  through  the  trees, 
and  no  touch  of  its  vastness  in  the  long,  narrow  line  of 
water  stretching  before  us  through  the  trees.  The  silence 
was  that  of  primeval  forest.  The  scents  were  inland  and 
tropical.  The  peace  was  immemorial  and  eternal.  The 
air  which  came  to  one  with  the  movement  of  the  boat  was 
warm  and  soft  and  caressing,  like  the  breath  of  a  sleeping 
child. 

On  either  bank,  tall  and  graceful  palm-trees  crowded  in 
a  density  through  which  neither  star-shine  nor  moon- 
light couM  make  a  glimmer.  The  trunks  of  those  nearest 
to  us  leaned  with  a  tired  languor  towards  the  water,  and 
their  heavy  branches  of  burnished  green  drooped  down- 
wards, tired  and  depressed,  as  though  weighted  by  the 
moonlight,  burning  on  their  outer  plumes.  High  over- 
head, in  central  heaven,  the  full  moon,  double-ringed 
with  orange  fire,  veiled  the  blinding  brightness  of  her 
beauty  and  poured  upon  the  aisle  of  water,  not  shafts 
of  lidless  light,  but  slumbrous  dust  of  silver  —  a  falling 


62  OTHER  SHEEP 

mist  of  clouded  radiance  which  was  like  an  opiate  to  the 
senses. 

Every  now  and  then  we  saw^  on  the  banks  mud  huts 
roofed  with  palm-leaves,  and  heard  a  woman  crooning 
to  her  child.  The  rhythmic  sound  of  the  poles,  first  strik- 
ing the  water  and,  after  the  shove,  rising  with  a  dripping 
noise  to  the  moonlight,  came  to  our  ears  with  the  calls  of 
birds  disturbed  in  the  forest.  We  heard,  too,  the  monot- 
onous sound  of  bare  feet  in  the  prow  and  in  the  stern,  as 
the  punters  moved  backwards  and  forwards  at  their  work. 

I  watched  the  stars  and  gave  myself  up  to  the  breathing 
charni  of  the  forest,  till  my  senses  were  drowned  in  sleep. 
Under  a  canopy  of  palm-leaves,  my  head  resting  on  a  pil- 
low, my  body  covered  by  a  sheet,  I  fell  into  as  calm 
and  blissful  a  sleep  as  the  serenity  of  stars  ever  gave  to 
mortal  man.  But  only  for  a  brief  space  did  I  lose  myself 
in  this  deep  slumber.  I  woke  to  the  discordance  of  hell. 
Shouts,  yells,  screams  filled  my  ears.  I  raised  my  head 
and  looked  out.  The  forest  had  disappeared.  There 
was  neither  moon  nor  stars.  All  was  darkness  —  a  pitchy 
blackness  which  hid  everything  from  the  eyes  and  closed 
about  one  like  a  muffling  cloak.  I  felt  the  boat  moving 
forward  at  a  furious  speed,  but  could  see  no  w^ater.  I 
knew  that  the  natives  were  pressing  on  their  poles,  but 
could  hear  no  sound  of  their  pattering  feet.  Clamour  and 
darkness  were  all  I  could  comprehend.  Then  a  light 
flashed  at  me  —  close  to  the  edge  of  the  boat. 

We  were  passing  through  a  long  tunnel  in  the  moun- 
tains, and  the  shouting  noise  came  from  the  natives  at 
either  end  of  our  long  craft.  They  were  making  pande- 
monium to  drive  away,  or  at  any  rate  to  keep  at  arm's 
length,  the  devils  supposed  to  haunt  the  interior  darkness 


TWO  PANDALS  63 

of  the  earth.  A  drizzle  of  water  dripped  from  the  curved 
roof  of  the  tunnel.  Lamps  were  burning  dimly  in  the 
walls  at  far  distances. 

Soon  I  relapsed  into  the  deliciousness  of  my  former 
oblivion,  and  when  I  next  opened  my  eyes  it  was  a  few 
minutes  before  the  dawn.  At  the  end  of  the  green  arcade 
of  water  and  trees,  the  sky  was  ribbed  with  bars  of  grey 
cloud  edged  with  scarlet  flame ;  beneath  this  grating  was  a 
flare  of  liquid  yellow:  above  it  the  sunless  sky  was  the 
softest  of  pale  blues.  As  we  looked,  the  grey  bars  of 
clouds  thinned  into  flecks  of  fire  which  rose  and  presently 
floated  away  like  a  flock  of  birds.  The  green  lines  of 
palm-trees  began  to  dazzle  the  eyes ;  the  liquid  yellow  of 
the  distant  horizon  became  so  radiant  that  it  hurt  the 
gaze;  and  then  out  of  the  water  flooding  with  fire  rose  the 
red  rim  of  the  sun  and  throbbed  and  blinked  and  pulsated 
till  distance  glowed  like  molten  gold  and  the  whole  earth 
became  conscious  of  heat. 

The  crew  were  laughing  at  their  work.  Their  thin 
arms  as  they  lifted  the  poles  shone  with  sweat,  their  legs 
as  they  walked  forward  and  pushed  off  with  one  foot 
from  the  curved  prow  ran  with  moisture,  their  chocolate- 
coloured  backs  bending  and  straining,  every  muscle  visible 
and  hard,  glittered  with  a  dew  of  toil.  Their  faces  were 
as  wet  as  if  they  had  been  plunged  into  water.  In  a  lan- 
guage of  guttural  velocity  they  called  to  each  other,  and 
laughed  across  their  faces,  showing  teeth  as  white  as  the 
flesh  of  coco-nuts.  The  palms  of  their  hands  and  the 
soles  of  their  feet  were  as  pale  as  a  European's. 

In  issuing  from  the  canals  and  passing  across  the  lakes 
we  had  glimpses  of  natives  working  in  the  rice-fields  — 
little  armies  of  black  men  and  women  almost  as  naked  as 


64  OTHER  SHEEP 

on  the  day  they  were  born.  The  air  was  now  filled  with 
the  song  of  birds.  Dragon-flies  of  brilliant  colour  flashed 
past  us  with  a  buzz.  On  either  side  were  gorgeous  flow- 
ers and  the  rich  leafage  of  croton  plants.  The  colours  of 
the  rainbow  glowed  at  us  from  the  wings  of  birds  and 
butterflies.     .     .     . 

Before  noon  we  reached  Trivandrum  and  disembarked 
at  a  landing-stage  crowded  with  natives.  We  left  our 
servant  to  bring  on  the  luggage,  and  set  out  in  a  gharry 
for  the  Travellers'  Bungalow. 

Trivandrum  is  a  city  which  is  never  seen.  No  one  has 
set  eyes  upon  it.  From  the  Maharajah  in  his  palace  and 
the  able  representative  of  Great  Britain  at  the  Residency, 
down  to  the  oldest  coolie  and  the  most  ancient  harridan 
among  the  outcast  sweepers,  no  one  has  beheld  Trivan- 
drum. For  this  mighty  city,  with  thousands  of  inhabi- 
tants, has  been  built  into  a  forest  so  vast  as  to  hide  it, 
and  so  undulating  as  to  separate  it  into  hundreds  of  scat- 
tered fragments.  Red  roads,  soft  and  dusty,  wind 
through  the  forest;  and  as  one  drives  along,  a  church  or 
a  bungalow  appears  for  a  moment  and  then  as  suddenly 
disappears ;  a  line  of  mud  huts  wedged  between  the  trees 
scarcely  discloses  itself  as  a  native  street,  so  dense  is  the 
gloom,  so  subdued  the  colour  of  the  huts ;  a  clearing  made 
in  the  trees  for  a  palace  or  a  mansion  seems  like  a  trivial 
vista  in  the  midst  of  an  everlasting  jungle  of  immemorial 
trees. 

The  Travellers'  Bungalow  is  said  to  be  one  of  the  very 
best  of  these  Governmental  rest-houses  in  India.  The 
secret  is  that  sometimes  it  is  used  for  an  overflow  of 
guests  from  the  British  Residency.  The  rooms  are 
large  and  lofty ;  the  furniture  is  good  and  cool ;  the  serv- 


TWO  PANDALS  65 

ice  is  excellent;  and  the  food  eatable.  It  is  a  beautiful 
low  building,  with  a  red-tiled  roof,  a  portico  hung  with 
cool  ferns  in  the  centre  of  the  veranda,  and  a  pleasant,  if 
dusty  garden,  where  the  sun  beats  upon  hundreds  of 
flowers  and  the  crows  ceaselessly  caw  from  the  surround- 
ing trees  which  shut  it  in  and  altogether  isolate  it  from 
the  rest  of  Trivandrum. 

That  evening  we  made  the  acquaintance  of  an  Eng- 
lishman on  the  veranda,  and  after  smoking  a  cigar  with 
him,  strolled,  at  his  suggestion,  through  the  garden  and 
out  into  the  moonlighted  road,  to  visit  a  neighbouring 
pandal  across  the  road,  in  which  was  being  celebrated 
the  festival  of  Mohurrum.  Our  presence  in  the 
group  of  Mussulmans  occasioned  some  surprise,  but  the 
crowd  parted  for  us,  a  lounging  figure  in  white,  with  a 
fez  on  his  black  head,  rose  hurriedly  to  greet  us  with  a 
smiling  courtesy,  and  we  were  conducted  to  the  chief 
seats  in  front  of  the  garish  pandal  and  offered  cigarettes 
and  cigars.  This  pandal,  which  had  a  kind  of  altar  or 
shrine  at  the  back,  before  which  food  was  placed  for  the 
Prophet,  was  decorated  with  tinsel  stars,  Japanese  lan- 
terns, paper  flags  of  various  colours,  and  branches  of 
palm. 

It  was  a  scene  most  picturesque  and  Asian.  The 
ground  in  front  of  us  was  occupied  by  squatting  figures 
in  various  coloured  dresses  and  turbans  and  loin  cloths; 
a  large  Punch  and  Judy  box  faced  us  in  the  distance, 
occupied  by  two  men  with  a  little  girl  in  the  centre, 
motionless,  and  whitened.  Men  dressed  as  women  and 
animals  danced  and  joked  and  clowned  in  the  little  space 
immediately  before  our  chairs.  At  every  ten  minutes 
or  so,  the  tom-tom  was  banged  monotonously  and  the 


66  OTHER  SHEEP 

whole  company  broke  into  a  nasal  drone  which  deafened 
the  ears  and  made  discord  of  peace  and  mind. 

From  first  to  last  this  religious  festival  was  prurient 
and  suggestive,  everything  turning  upon  sexualism. 
Certain  things  that  I  saw  cannot  be  written,  but  on  the 
whole  the  immorality  was  rather  that  of  corrupted  chil- 
dren than  the  abhorrent  bestiality  of  depraved  minds. 
It  was  rather  jaded  iniquity  than  determined  depravity. 
Again  and  again  I  found  myself  regarding  the  people  as 
children,  and  in  their  simple  smiling  faces  and  the  almost 
listless  character  of  their  attention,  I  saw  that  one  should 
feel  pity  for  them,  and  not  judge  them  as  men  before 
whom  a  choice  has  been  presented  and  who  have  elected 
for  iniquity.  They  were  beating  the  tom-tom,  singing 
their  songs,  and  dancing  their  wriggling  dances  till  three 
o'clock  in  the  morning. 

I  have  mentioned  this  trivial  incident  as  a  contrast  to 
what  follows,  as  a  contrast  which  should  bring  home  to 
the  least  imaginative  of  readers  the  immense  difference 
between  the  mind  of  Christ  and  the  mind  of  Asia. 

On  the  day  following  our  arrival  in  Trivandrum  we 
were  invited  by  Fakir  Singh  to  attend  an  afternoon  meet- 
ing in  the  compound  of  the  Salvation  Army's  Girls' 
School,  where  another  and  far  bigger  pandal  had  been 
set  up,  but  for  a  very  different  purpose.  Of  all  the  sights 
I  saw  in  India,  this  was  one  that  made  the  most  instant 
impression.  When  we  arrived,  we  found  the  trees  sur- 
rounding the  sun-flooded  compound  filled  in  all  their 
branches  with  men  and  boys;  the  great  space  of  the  com- 
pound in  front  of  the  pandal  entirely  occupied  by  a  dense 
multitude  of  men  and  women;  the  pandal  itself  filled 
from  end  to  end  with  boys  and  girls ;  and  the  veranda  of 


TWO  PANDALS  67 

the  school  packed  with  high-caste  natives,  officers  of  the 
army,  and  European  residents  interested  in  the  amazing 
work  of  the  Salvation  Army.  It  was  one  of  the  most 
striking  congregations  I  have  ever  seen.  And  all  those 
squatting  thousands  on  the  ground  surrounding  the  pan- 
dal,  all  those  bird-like  figures  loading  the  trees,  all  that 
mass  of  black-faced  and  solemn-eyed  humanity  packed 
so  tightly  and  sitting  so  patiently,  had  come  into  Trivan- 
drum  from  the  neighbouring  villages,  some  of  them 
twenty-five  and  thirty  miles  away,  to  hear  the  story  of 
that  Divine  Man  whose  Personality  has  revolutionized 
the  other  side  of  the  world.  They  had  brought  their 
food  with  them ;  they  had  slept  under  the  trees  or  in  their 
bullock-carts  on  the  way,  and  to-night,  after  the  long 
entertainment  had  come  to  an  end  they  would  stretch 
their  rolls  of  matting  on  the  ground  where  they  were  now 
sitting,  and  sleep  till  the  dawn. 

These  villagers  were  in  some  cases  the  laity  of  the 
Salvation  Army,  in  some  cases  inquirers,  and  in  some 
cases  waverers  not  yet  wholly  persuaded  to  abandon  their 
gods  of  terror  and  give  themselves  to  a  God  perfectly 
pure,  perfectly  holy,  and  perfectly  kind.  They  had  been 
sought  in  their  distant  villages  by  officers  of  the  Army, 
and  for  a  year  at  least  many  of  them  had  gathered  to- 
gether to  hear  the  Bible  read  and  listen  to  the  preachers 
of  Christ. 

The  first  part  of  the  afternoon's  programme  was  given 
to  the  children.  We  heard  the  boys'  band  playing  such 
music  as  tom-tom  and  bamboo-reed  can  never  make  — 
glad  music,  and  strong  music,  music  to  which  men  can 
march  with  their  heads  upright,  a  music  made  for 
triumph  and  unconquerable  hope.     To  teach  these  boys 


68  OTHER  SHEEP 

any  music  at  all  is  something  of  a  victory,  but  to  teach 
them  such  music  as  we  heard,  and  to  teach  them  to  play 
it  so  accurately  and  with  such  a  swing  in  its  joy  —  this 
is  achievement  of  a  notable  kind.  And  the  music  had 
passed  into  the  souls  of  the  boys.  Instead  of  slouching 
bodies,  they  stood  upright  and  strong;  instead  of  matted 
or  twisted  hair,  their  heads  were  as  neat  and  brushed  as 
a  British  soldier's;  instead  of  scowling  looks  and  heavy 
sensualism,  their  faces  were  bright  with  intelligence  and 
glad  with  health.  It  seemed  an  illusion  that  these  hand- 
some and  smart  boys  could  be  the  sons  of  the  crouching 
villagers  massed  together  in  the  dust  of  the  compound. 

We  saw  a  company  of  girls  in  pretty  frocks  perform 
a  drill  with  their  coloured  scarves.  We  heard  them 
sing.  We  heard  them  recite.  We  saw  them  act. 
From  beginning  to  end,  only  a  little  nervousness  marred 
the  performance  of  these  childish  minds  awaking  to  intel- 
ligence. They  looked  so  pretty  and  charming,  they  were 
so  kempt  and  self-respecting,  there  was  such  under- 
standing in  their  eyes  and  in  the  smiling  curves  of  their 
lips,  that  one  had  constantly  to  remind  oneself  that  these 
were  the  children  of  heathen  villagers,  so  profoundly 
ignorant  and  so  disastrously  superstitious  that  they  can 
almost  be  described  as  savages.^ 

But  the  first  note  of  definite  religious  interest  came 
when  Fakir  Singh,  Commissioner  for  the  Salvation 
Army  in     India,   rose  to   address   the   multitude.     He 

1  For  five  shillings  a  month  the  Salvation  Army  can  feed,  clothe, 
and  teach  a  child  in  its  excellent  schools.  It  is  only  lack  of  money 
which  keeps  a  host  of  children  outside  those  crowded  doors.  I 
looked  at  the  savage  children  and  I  looked  at  the  children  of  the 
Army,  and*  felt  how  hard  it  was  that  the  one  should  be  blessed  and 
the  other  cursed. 


TWO  PANDALS  69 

began  by  saying  that  everybody  there  had  at  least  heard 
about  Jesus,  that  they  all  knew  what  Jesus  asked  human- 
ity to  become,  and  that  the  One  True  God  Who  is  the 
Father  of  humanity  only  asks  His  children  to  conquer 
their  sins  in  order  that  they  may  be  everlastingly  happy 
as  pure  angels  in  a  beautiful  heaven.  I  watched  the 
faces  of  the  multitude.  Heads  were  bent  forward  to 
hear,  in  all  those  thousands  of  eyes  there  was  intensity 
of  interest,  in  not  one  single  face  did  I  see  self-conscious- 
ness, stupidity,  or  an  inclination  to  smile.  Men  and 
women,  young  men  and  young  girls  —  the  whole  vast 
multitude,  listened  with  a  rapt  attention.  They  were 
like  enthralled  children  listening  to  a  story. 

Then  came  a  dramatic  incident.  Suddenly  in  the 
midst  of  his  simple  talk  the  Fakir  asked  how  many  of 
the  people  who  had  heard  about  Jesus  wanted  to  con- 
quer their  sins  and  to  become  gentle  and  kind,  pure  and 
virtuous,  good  and  holy.  In  a  second  the  air  was  filled 
with  lifted  arms.  I  do  not  think  there  was  a  single 
person  in  all  that  large  gathering  who  did  not  lift  an 
arm  to  heaven. 

"  Those  hands  of  yours,"  said  the  Fakir,  his  eyes  shin- 
ing and  his  voice  very  quiet  and  earnest,  "  are  prayers. 
Your  Father  sees  them  and  understands.  He  beholds 
you  with  a  tender  and  compassionate  love.  He  knows 
your  hearts  —  your  hearts  which  are  hidden  from  all 
the  world.  According  to  your  sincerity  He  will  answer 
your  prayer.  And  now  let  us  bow  our  heads,  and  fold 
our  hands,  and  pray  to  Him  in  silence." 

It  was  an  unforgettable  sight.  The  faces  which  a 
moment  before  had  been  raised  to  the  speaker  —  faces 
of  men,  many  of  them,  expressing  every  degree  of  sav- 


70  OTHER  SHEEP 

agery  and  woe,  bestiality  and  suffering:  faces  of  women 
strangely  beautiful  and  yet  marred  by  a  frowning  dis- 
content or  a  heavy  animalism  —  became  suddenly  bowed 
and  hidden.  The  compound  was  filled  with  silence.  Not 
a  finger  was  moved.  Not  a  robe  stirred.  The  multi- 
tude was  motionless.  And  the  sun  beat  down  through 
the  trees  on  this  field  of  humanity  lifting  its  soul  to  God. 
One  realized  at  that  moment  how  frightful  is  the 
penalty  of  sin,  and  how  immediate  the  appeal  of  Christ 
to  the  human  soul  once  definitely  conscious  of  its  misery. 
Many  of  these  villagers  who  have  hitherto  followed  their 
natural  inclinations  all  the  days  of  their  lives,  who  have 
ever  felt  the  world  to  be  simple  animalism,  and  the  uni- 
verse filled  with  gods  as  lustful  and  bestial  as  themselves, 
who  can  live  so  easily  and  with  so  little  dread,  who  are 
surrounded  by  nature's  most  lovely  manifestations,  and 
enjoy  a  climate  w^hich  is  summer  almost  from  year's 
end  to  year's  end  —  are  wretched  and  unhappy,  are 
conscious  of  something  wrong  in  life,  are  aware  of 
something  inexpressible  and  undefined  which  disquiets 
and  hurts  their  hearts.  And  immediately  they  hear  the 
simple  story  of  the  Christ,  they  feel  the  sun  shine  into 
the  darkness  of  their  souls  and  an  answering  response 
stirring  in  the  depths  of  their  hearts.  They  do  not  say, 
Is  it  true?  They  do  not  dispute  and  contend.  They 
set  no  casuistry  of  the  mind  between  their  souls  and  the 
great  joy  coming  to  them  out  of  the  new  heavens.  They 
only  know  that  it  is  restful  and  sweet  to  lay  the  burden 
of  their  long  misery  at  the  feet  of  One  Who  is  sinless 
and  compassionate,  human  and  Divine:  that  to  set  them- 
selves for  the  sake  of  this  adorable  Person  to  be  better, 
presents  a  goal  which  more  really  and  worthily  fills  and 


TWO  PANDALS  71 

widens  the  horizon  of  their  lives  than  the  labour  of  the 
fields;  and  that  to  contemplate  God  as  a  Father  Who 
cares  for  them,  and,  because  He  cares  for  them,  is  seek- 
ing to  fit  them  for  higher  joys  and  purer  heights  of 
being  than  anything  they  can  imagine  or  dream,  makes 
of  existence  at  one  stroke  a  rational  and  a  glorious  op- 
portunity. 

These  villagers  had  streamed  into  the  town  of  Tri- 
vandrum,  not  so  much  to  see  their  children  performing 
in  the  afternoon,  as  to  hear  in  the  evening  once  more, 
and  this  time  in  a  new  way,  the  story  of  Christ.  Offi- 
cers of  the  Salvation  Army  had  visited  them  in  their 
houses,  had  held  meetings  in  their  villages,  and  had  read 
to  them  from  the  New  Testament  the  story  of  Christ; 
but  now  they  were  actually  to  see  with  their  eyes  what 
hitherto  they  had  heard  with  their  ears. 

In  the  evening  the  compound  was  more  densely 
crowded  than  in  the  afternoon.  At  least  five  thousand 
people  —  probably  many  more  —  were  sitting  on  the 
ground  under  the  stars,  fathers  and  sons,  mothers  and 
daughters,  brothers  and  sisters  —  a  dense  swarm  of 
black-faced  and  almost  naked  humanity,  whose  eyes  re- 
flected the  moonlight  and  whose  white  turbans  and  loin 
cloths  shone  like  the  cerements  of  a  graveyard  wak- 
ened to  immortality.  Only  a  few  lamps  were  burning. 
The  interior  of  the  pandal  was  occupied  at  the  back  by 
a  w^hite  sheet.  In  the  centre  of  the  multitude  was  an 
officer  of  the  Army  with  a  magic  lantern.  When  the 
lights  were  put  out,  and  the  people  had  sung  a  hymn, 
one  could  still  see  the  glitter  of  eyes  and  the  shine  of  dark 
skins  in  the  moonlight. 

It  was  very  striking  to  observe  the  effect  made  upon 


^2  OTHER  SHEEP 

these  awaking  savages  by  the  picture  of  General  Booth 
when  it  appeared  upon  the  sheet.  There  was  a  cry  of 
admiration  and  love,  hands  were  clapped  with  an  aban- 
donment to  enthusiasm,  and  then  a  shout  of  acclaim 
rose  from  all  the  host.  One  thought  of  the  humble  work 
begun  in  East  London  only  a  few  years  ago  by  a  Not- 
tingham preacher,  and  reminded  oneself  of  the  fame  of 
this  old  man,  not  only  in  the  distant  forest  of  Southern 
India,  but  all  over  the  wide  world  and  among  all  the 
various  races  of  humanity. 

There  were  other  pictures:  and  then  came  the  Life  of 
Christ,  told  by  paintings  and  moving-pictures.  As  one 
followed  the  simple  story,  through  all  the  beauty  of  its 
earlier  incidents  to  the  culminating  tragedy  which  has 
changed  the  heart  of  the  human  race  and  given  a  new 
heaven  to  the  soul  of  man,  one  perceived  how  infinitely 
higher  and  more  compelling,  how  infinitely  more  human 
and  Divine,  how  infinitely  simpler  and  appealing  is  the 
religion  of  Christ  than  all  the  perversions  of  religion 
which  have  nailed  the  soul  of  Asia  to  the  rock  of  suf- 
fering and  sin.  They  cannot  be  compared.  Hinduism 
is  not  another  path  to  God;  it  is  a  pit  of  abomination 
as  far  set  from  God  as  the  mind  of  man  can  go.  It 
is  not  the  Bread  of  Life,  but  the  Dead  Sea  fruit  of 
bitterness  and  death.  It  is  not  hope,  but  despair.  It 
is  not  effort,  but  surrender.  It  is  not  attainment,  but 
defeat. 

When  the  story  had  been  told,  a  lamp  was  brought 
into  the  pandal,  and  the  Fakir  stood  up  and  appealed  to 
those  whose  hearts  had  been  touched  and  searched  by 
the  pictures,  that  very  night  to  come  out  and  make  peti- 
tion to  heaven  for  its  mercy  and  its  love.     He  spoke  in 


TWO  PANDALS  73 

simple  language,  making  use  of  parables  which  a  child 
might  understand,  and  set  himself  to  awaken  in  the  mul- 
titude a  desire  for  goodness  and  a  longing  for  peace  of 
heart.  Nothing  could  have  been  more  simple,  more 
quiet,  more  true.  It  was  the  Christianity  of  the  Mount 
of  Olives. 

For  a  moment  or  two  after  his  appeal  there  was 
silence,  breathless  and  nervous.  He  made  a  second 
appeal,  saying,  "  Who  will  be  the  first  to  come  out  and 
ask  God  to  forgive  his  sins  ?  "  A  young  man  rose  from 
the  midst  of  the  sitting  multitude,  and  made  his  difficult 
way  to  the  pandal.  He  was  clothed  in  a  white  turban  and 
a  white  loin  cloth,  with  a  shoulder  cloth  of  white  hang- 
ing at  one  side  of  his  body.  He  was  tall,  good-looking 
and  of  great  strength.  There  was  a  sulky  nobility  in  his 
eyes  and  an  obstinate  resolution  in  his  strong  lips.  He 
looked  neither  to  the  right  nor  to  the  left.  His  head  was 
a  little  bowed.  His  arms  moved  gracefully  at  his  sides. 
The  light  of  the  lamp  shone  in  his  eyes  and  the  light 
of  the  moon  on  his  black  shoulders  and  neck.  He  was 
like  a  shepherd. 

Others  followed  his  example.  One  saw  officers  of 
the  Salvation  Army,  Indians  and  Europeans,  moving 
among  the  seated  thousands,  and  bending  down  to 
speak  to  them.  In  the  meantime  the  wide  and  spacious 
pandal  was  crowded  with  kneeling  figures.  Women  and 
girls  congregated  together,  and  women  of  the  Salva- 
tion Army  kneeled  at  their  sides,  mothering  them,  and 
encouraging  their  prayers.  Men  formed  by  far  the 
greater  number  of  kneeling  figures,  most  of  them  young 
men  between  twenty  and  thirty  years  of  age.  They 
kneeled  in  the  dust,  their  hands  at  their  sides,  their  eyes 


74  OTHER  SHEEP 

opened,  their  heads  slightly  raised  —  figures  so  still  that 
they  might  have  been  carved  in  ebony. 

There  v^as  now  a  ceaseless  stream  of  men  and  women 
into  the  pandal.  The  seriousness  of  the  procession,  and 
the  solemnity  of  the  kneeling  multitude,  made  a  pro- 
found impression.  Presently,  encouraged  by  the  Fakir, 
who  moved  amongst  them  praying  and  blessing  them, 
the  whole  kneeling  company  began  to  pray  aloud.  The 
noise  of  those  deep  voices  filled  the  night.  Each  man 
prayed  his  own  prayer,  uttered  his  own  longings,  ex- 
pressed his  own  needs.  In  a  low  monotone,  rising  to 
an  almost  ringing  earnestness,  thousands  of  Tamils  and 
Malayalis  lifted  their  voices  to  the  Father  of  humanity, 
while  the  hundreds  in  the  pandal  besought  Him  to  for- 
give their  sins,  to  heal  their  wretchedness,  and  to  accept 
them  as  His  children. 

Imagine  the  scene.  As  far  as  eye  could  see,  stretch- 
ing out  into  the  glimmering  moonlight  of  an  Eastern 
garden,  there  were  thousands  of  half -naked  people  sit- 
ting and  standing  on  the  ground,  hunched  up  on  the 
boughs  of  trees,  packed  shoulder  to  shoulder  on  the  walls. 
Under  a  great  open  tent  of  palm-leaves,  where  a  lamp 
was  burning  and  unlighted  paper  lanterns  were  hanging 
from  the  branches,  hundreds  of  men  and  women  were 
kneeling  and  praying  to  God,  with  white  and  black 
officers  of  the  Salvation  Army  moving  in  and  out 
among  them.  Those  of^cers  represented  many  nations: 
among  them  were  a  Brahman,  a  Singhalese,  a  Malayali, 
a  Tamil,  a  German,  a  Norwegian,  a  Swede,  an  Austra- 
lian, an  Englishman,  and  a  Scot.  All  were  praying. 
The  voices  of  these  various  nationalities  rose  in  the  air 
with  a  cry  inspired  by  love  for  a  sinless  Ideal,  with  a 


TWO  PANDALS  75 

passion  and  a  longing  uttered  from  the  need  of  their 
common  humanity;  and  all  these  separate  voices  and 
different  words  rose  in  a  perfect  unison,  like  the  prayer 
of  a  single  family  under  their  father's  roof.  One  felt 
that  the  unity  of  nations  is  not  a  dream,  but  one  of  the 
very  first  and  most  certain  results  of  a  catholic  Chris- 
tianity. The  kneeling  host,  the  rolling  thunder  of  their 
supplication,  the  moonlight,  the  solemn  stillness  of  the 
trees,  the  reverence  and  quiet  of  the  watching  multitude, 
and  those  servants  of  God  drawn  to  India  out  of  all  the 
nations  of  the  earth  moving  to  and  fro  in  the  midst  of 
them  —  one  felt  at  that  moment  the  passion  of  religion 
and  the  Fatherhood  of  God. 

I  can  still  see  those  kneeling  Children  of  India.  I 
can  still  see  the  disciples  of  Christ  moving  amongst 
them.  I  can  still  feel  the  soft  and  scented  air  of  that 
Eastern  night,  and  see  the  moonlight  shining  on  the 
white  garments  of  the  watching  multitude.  And  I  can 
still  hear,  as  though  it  were  an  organ  in  the  next  room, 
the  mighty  sound  of  those  many  voices  rolling  up  to 
their  new  heaven  and  making  appeal  to  their  new  God 
and  their  first  Father  in  heaven.  As  I  recall  that 
scene,  I  see  the  sensual  grins  and  jaded  eyes  of  the  poor 
Mussulmans  round  their  street-corner  pandal  in  honour 
of  Mohurrum. 

An  hour  after  this  wonderful  experience,  I  was  talk- 
ing to  a  man  who  had  been  devil-possessed  for  many 
years,  and  whose  remarkable  story  appears  in  the  next 
chapter.  When  I  parted  with  him  and  issued  from  the 
interior  of  the  school  premises,  I  found  the  veranda 
occupied  by  women  sleeping  on  mats  and  the  whole 
wide    garden    strewn    with    sleeping    figures.     In    the 


^6  OTHER  SHEEP 

moonlight,  surrounded  by  the  tall  trunks  of  palmyra  and 
coco-nut  palms,  and  by  the  interwoven  branches  of  flower- 
ing shrubs  and  scented  trees,  the  spectacle  was  one  of 
singular  beauty  and  a  most  gracious  appeal.  Those 
tired  sleepers,  sleeping  in  the  dust  of  the  garden,  had 
come  many  miles  through  the  hills  and  the  forest  to  hear 
the  story  of  Christ;  the  bullocks  and  carts  of  some  of 
them  were  visible  in  the  shadows;  the  sound  of  their 
breathing  was  like  the  noise  of  a  summer  sea ;  before  the 
dawn  they  would  be  moving  with  their  wives  and  fam- 
ilies back  through  the  jungle,  and  back  over  the  hills, 
to  the  mud  huts  of  their  distant  villages.  Some  of  them 
that  very  night  had  "  found  Christ."  Some  of  them 
were  sleeping  with  a  new  peace  in  their  hearts  and  a  new 
joy  in  their  souls.  All  of  them,  perhaps,  had  drawn  at 
least  a  little  closer  to  the  Light  of  the  World. 

It  was  like  a  scene  from  the  Bible.  The  heaviness  of 
the  languorous  leafage,  the  softness  of  the  air,  the  ex- 
treme brightness  of  the  moon,  and  the  grinding  splen- 
dour of  the  stars  —  these,  and  the  breathing  multitude 
hooded  and  wrapped  in  white  garments,  lying  at  full 
length  on  the  ground,  so  silent  and  so  still,  filling  the 
whole  garden  with  the  sense  of  human  weariness  and 
heavenly  care  —  touched  the  mind  with  thoughts  of 
those  who  had  crossed  the  hills  of  Galilee  two  thousand 
years  ago  on  a  like  errand. 

One  walked  softly  through  that  garden,  not  for  fear 
of  awaking  the  sleepers,  but  out  of  reverence  for  the 
hush  which  brooded  there  like  the  blessing  of  God. 


THE  DEVIL-DANCER 

He  crouched  against  a  wall,  one  leg  under  him,  an  elbow 
resting  on  the  upraised  knee  of  the  other  leg,  with  the 
hand  pressed  against  his  face.  He  was  naked  except 
for  a  sack-coloured  shoulder  cloth  and  a  grey  cover- 
ing about  his  loins.  His  skin  was  a  dusk-deadened  cop- 
per. His  black  hair  stood  out  from  the  sides  of  his 
head  and  rose  in  tangled  confusion  from  his  brow.  The 
dark  eyebrows  pressed  upon  the  lids  of  long  and  watch- 
ful eyes  which  were  full  of  serious  brightness.  The 
upper  lip  was  shaded  by  a  line  of  smooth  hair.  The 
mouth  was  sullen  and  threatening;  when  he  spoke  the 
lips  opened  quickly  and  wide,  showing  teeth  which  had 
been  filed  to  tigerish  sharp  points.  Across  the  prominent 
cheek  bones  the  face  was  broad  and  vigorous;  at  the 
chin  it  was  pointed  and  peevish.  I  have  seen  few  ani- 
mals so  naked  of  dignity  and  repose,  and  no  human  being 
outside  of  a  madhouse  so  unalterably  marked  with  mental 
anguish. 

I  sat  on  a  chair  in  front  of  him,  and  at  his  side  knelt 
an  Indian  officer  of  the  Salvation  Army,  able  to  speak 
the  man's  difficult  dialect,  who  acted  as  interpreter. 
While  I  was  speaking  the  crouching  Alalayali  regarded 
me  with  a  look  of  watchful  fear;  when  my  question  was 
interpreted  he  turned  his  head  to  the  Salvationist  and 
spoke  rapidly,  in  a  voice  of  eager  anxiety,  using  few 
gestures  with  his  arms,  but  those  fine  and  commanding, 

17 


78  OTHER  SHEEP 

often  rolling  his  head  from  side  to  side  in  distress  at  not 
making  himself  understood,  or  raising  his  eyes  to.  the 
roof  of  the  veranda  under  which  he  was  crouching  with 
a  look  of  most  eloquent  faith  and  joy  in  God  —  a  small, 
animal-like  human  being,  with  dawning  intelligence  and 
exhausted  misery  in  his  eyes,  and  the  beginnings  of  a 
new  philosophy  in  his  just  awakened  soul. 

He  lived  in  a  distant  village  in  Southern  India  where 
for  many  centuries  the  people  have  offered  propitiatory 
worship  to  a  particularly  odious  devil.  His  father  was 
a  devil-possessed  man  who  lived  by  using  his  power  to 
exorcise  from  others  devils  less  powerful  than  those 
which  tormented  him.  The  faith  of  the  village  did  not 
trouble  itself  with  gods,  good  or  immoral.  The  people 
believed  in  a  power  of  evil  definitely  and  eternally 
arrayed  against  them.  To  offer  sacrifices  and  perform 
ceremonies  which  would  placate  this  afflicting  devil 
seemed  to  them  obviously  more  rational  than  to  suppli- 
cate any  god  whose  beneficent  qualities  surely  guaran- 
teed them  against  the  possibility  of  attack  from  that 
quarter. 

The  dancer's  father  may  be  described  as  a  priest  of 
this  devil-worship.  He  was  not  only  the  most  powerful 
exorciser  of  devils,  he  was  not  only  a  seeker  of  favours 
from  his  devil,  but  he  had  definitely  made  a  compact 
with  this  devil  to  serve  him  on  earth  and  in  the  worlds 
beyond.  In  some  dreadful  and  unrecorded  moment  of 
his  tortured  life  this  man  of  the  jungle  and  the  moun- 
tains had  sold  his  soul  to  that  power  of  evil  in  the  uni- 
verse which  seemed  to  him  the  master  of  his  fate. 
Henceforth,  a  freeman  of  hell,  he  offered  sacrifices  in 
a  devil  grove,  and  went  about  the  villages  earning  money 


THE  DEVIL-DANCER  79 

for  the  arrack  he  drank  day  and  night  by  casting  out 
devils  and  praying  for  favours  and  mercy  to  the  chief 
of  the  devils  in  the  name  of  those  troubled  with  sick- 
ness, calamity,  and  fear. 

The  boy  was  twelve  years  of  age  when  his  father  w^as 
stricken  with  illness.  He  was  a  normal  boy  of  the  vil- 
lage, quick  and  vivacious,  but  as  heathen  and  ignorant 
as  all  the  rest  of  his  community.  Up  till  that  time  he 
had  little  troubled  his  head  about  devils,  beyond  taking 
care  never  to  go  out  after  dark  and  always  to  avoid  such 
places  as  burying  grounds,  where  a  great  number  of 
devils  were  known  to  have  their  dwelling.  But  now 
he  had  a  new-birth  and  experienced  a  perverted  con- 
version, terrible  in  the  consequences.  The  father  was 
raving  and  gnashing  his  teeth  on  his  deathbed.  The 
family  stood  round  the  writhing  figure,  regarding  it  with 
consternation.  Suddenly  the  father  started  up,  and  seiz- 
ing his  son  by  the  long  hair  of  his  head,  dragged  the  boy 
down  to  him,  and  rubbing  ashes  upon  his  head  cried  in 
a  loud  voice,  "  Promise  me  to  serve  the  devil  —  promise 
me,  promise  me !  "  Then,  loosing  the  child,  he  spread 
his  arms  to  the  group  of  his  wife  and  children,  and  im- 
plored them  with  his  last  breath  to  yield  their  souls  to 
the  devil.     His  last  words  were,  *'  Serve  the  devil." 

For  three  or  four  days  nothing  occurred.  The  life 
of  the  family  went  on  as  usual.  The  death  of  the  devil- 
possessed  father  seemed  to  make  no  difference  in  its  for- 
tunes. There  was  the  same  poverty,  the  same  frugality, 
the  same  misery,  and  the  same  monotony  of  labour.  But 
one  night  as  the  eldest  son  lay  on  his  ragged  mat  wait- 
ing for  sleep,  he  felt  himself  suddenly  stricken  with  a 
deadly  cold  which  convulsed  all  his  limbs  and  shook  him 


8o  OTHER  SHEEP 

with  so  great  a  trembling  that  the  teeth  rattled  and 
gridded  in  his  mouth.  He  says  that  he  saw  nothing, 
but  that  he  felt  the  approach  of  a  devil.  He  was  power- 
less to  scream,  powerless  to  ward  off  the  attack.  He 
lay  in  a  breathless  and  palsy-stricken  terror.  Then,  as 
if  a  cloud  had  swallowed  him  up,  he  felt  his  body  occu- 
pied by  something  not  himself,  became  aware  of  an 
overshadowing  and  masterful  spirit  sitting  in  the  tene- 
ment of  his  body  and  taking  absolute  possession  of  his 
will. 

He  became  unconscious.  Early  in  the  morning  he 
awoke,  and  leaving  his  house  plunged  into  the  jungle 
and  ascended  the  mountains.  He  does  not  know  why 
he  sought  this  solitude,  he  cannot  tell  why  he  was  not 
afraid  of  beasts  and  evil  spirits;  driven  into  the  wilder- 
ness by  the  demon  possessing  him,  he  simply  went  on 
and  on,  a  leaf  blown  by  the  wind,  a  spar  swept  by  the 
waves,  a  soul  bereft  of  volition  and  the  power  of  deter- 
mination. 

He  threw  himself  down  from  heights.  He  felt  him- 
self lifted  off  his  feet  into  the  air.  He  beat  himself  with 
stones,  tore  out  his  hair,  and  scratched  his  flesh  with 
his  nails  till  it  was  wet  with  blood.  The  night  came  and 
he  was  not  afraid.  Without  sleep  and  without  fatigue, 
he  wandered  hither  and  thither,  wailing  and  groaning, 
shouting  and  singing,  laughing  and  crying.  He  was 
conscious  neither  of  hunger  nor  thirst.  The  hot  sun 
blazed  down  upon  his  unprotected  head,  and  he  sought 
no  shade.  His  body  became  burned  with  the  heat,  and 
he  sought  no  water.  With  a  consciousness  which 
seemed  to  be  drowning,  suffocating,  and  expiring,  he 
felt  himself  swept  forward  by  the  devil  possessing  him. 


THE  DEVIL-DANCER  8i 

and  had  neither  the  will  nor  the  wish  to  fight  for  his 
safety. 

How  long  he  remained  in  the  jungle  on  that  occasion 
he  does  not  remember.  He  returned  eventually  to  his 
home  and  found  that  his  fame  was  established  as  a  devil- 
possessed  boy.  He  explains  that  his  devil  was  heredi- 
tary; that  as  far  as  memory  could  reach  members  of  his 
family  had  been  possessed  by  spirits;  that  at  the  death 
of  the  father  the  eldest  son  always  inherited  the  family's 
devil.  Every  one  in  the  village,  and  in  some  of  the 
neighbouring  villages,  recognized  his  devil  as  the  one 
which  had  possessed  the  father.  He  was  called  on  to 
exorcise  devils,  and  was  given  gifts  of  rice  for  his  serv- 
ices. 

Up  till  the  moment  of  his  possession  he  had  been  a 
good  boy.  He  had  been,  that  is  to  say,  perfectly  moral 
and  obedient.  He  is  quite  certain  on  this  point.  And 
he  is  also  quite  certain  that  from  the  moment  of  his  pos- 
session he  became  one  of  the  greatest  scoundrels  in  that 
neighbourhood.  He  became  sexually  vile  and  dreadful. 
He  craved  for  the  disgusting  spirit  called  arrack.  He 
loved  to  eat  and  rub  himself  with  filthy  things.  It  gave 
him,  not  pain,  but  positive  pleasure,  to  stab  and  slash 
himself  with  a  knife.  His  arms  are  yet  rutted  with 
gashes  and  his  neck  pitted  with  the  marks  of  his  stab- 
bings.  He  could  handle  fire,  and  would  rub  it  on  his 
head  and  body  without  being  either  blistered  or  hurt. 
He  could  put  himself  into  a  terrible  frenzy  and  perform 
in  this  state  acts  of  strength  and  daring  which  sent  his 
fame  into  all  the  countryside.  He  told  us  what  were 
the  signs  of  his  devil's  activity  and  frenzies.  He  would 
begin  to  spit  blood,  then  he  would  be  shaken  with  a 


82  OTHER  SHEEP 

palsy,  then  his  senses  would  become  jumbled,  muddled, 
and  covered  with  a  muffling  obscurity,  and  for  one  night 
every  bone  in  his  body  would  ache  as  though  he  had 
been  beaten  by  many  clubs.  After  that  he  was  pos- 
sessed and  swept  forward  for  days  and  weeks  by  the  devil 
possessing  him. 

He  never  saw  his  devil,  or  any  other  devil;  but  he 
described  with  a  wonderful  quickness  of  gesture  and  a 
sudden  flashing  of  the  eyes  what  he  has  seen  in  the 
darkness  of  the  night  and  the  solitude  of  the  jungle. 
Light  has  flashed  at  him  from  two  sides,  flashed  with 
incredible  swiftness,  as  if  two  fingers  of  flame  sprang 
upon  each  other  and  vanished  in  the  ferocity  of  their 
collision;  then  straight  in  front  of  him,  a  little  above  the 
level  of  his  eyes,  he  has  seen  a  creature  like  a  cat  spin- 
ning round  and  round  in  a  rush  so  electric  that  it  has 
made  a  circle  of  light  about  it  in  the  darkness;  and  he 
has  felt  monkeys  brushing  past  him  and  then  has  seen 
them  disappear  into  nothingness. 

Like  his  father  he  dedicated  himself  to  the  devil  — 
definitely  elected  to  serve  Evil.  He  became  as  really 
possessed  by  evil  spirits  as  saints  have  been  possessed  by 
the  Spirit  of  God.  All  his  experiences  are  a  perversion 
of  those  recorded  by  holy  men  and  pure  women  in  the 
literature  of  Christianity. 

On  one  occasion  he  spent  seven  days  and  nights  with- 
out nourishment  of  any  kind,  committing  excesses  of 
indescribable  horror  in  graveyards  and  wandering 
through  the  darkest  and  most  dangerous  parts  of  the 
jungle. 

He  became  the  most  celebrated  devil-possessed  man 
for  many  miles  around  his  village.     He  was  regarded 


THE  DEVIL-DANCER  83 

with  reverence  and  dread.  A  man  gave  him  his  daugh- 
ter in  marriage,  and  this  woman  worshipped  the  devil. 
People  of  high  caste  sent  for  him  to  cure  them  of  sick- 
ness or  to  offer  sacrifices  to  the  devil  in  times  of  plague 
or  famine.  On  one  occasion  a  Sudra  family  —  that  is 
to  say,  a  high-caste  family  —  sent  for  him  to  cast  out 
a  demon  afflicting  one  of  its  young  women.  This 
demon,  known  as  Rectasorie,  or  blood  devil,  tore  the 
girl  till  she  was  dabbled  all  over  with  blood.  The  devil- 
dancer  remained  with  her  for  seven  days,  wrestling 
ceaselessly  with  that  devil,  and  finally  cast  it  out.  The 
girl  was  completely  restored.  The  act  was  commemo- 
rated by  a  silver  medal  which  the  Sudra  himself  hung 
round  the  dancer's  neck,  placing  at  the  same  time  seven 
rupees  in  his  hand  —  a  large  sum  of  money  for  any  vil- 
lager in  India  to  earn  at  a  single  stroke. 

So  great  was  his  fame  that  it  checked  the  work  of 
Christianity  in  a  neighbouring  village  where  the  Sal- 
vation Army  had  lately  planted  a  local  Corps.  People 
challenged  the  Christians  to  perform  such  miracles  as 
this  man  could  do  every  day  of  the  week.  The  Ad- 
jutant was  a  Malayali,  a  man  converted  from  the  depths 
of  heathenism  to  the  heights  of  a  most  beautiful  purity. 
This  man,  feeling  himself  unworthy  to  attempt  miracles, 
set  himself  to  pray  for  the  soul  of  the  devil-dancer.  He 
gave  up  an  entire  week  to  this  purpose,  and  ceaselessly 
petitioned  God  all  those  seven  days  to  give  him  the  soul 
of  the  devil-priest. 

The  answer  to  his  prayer  seemed  to  be  a  growing  con- 
viction that  he  should  go  to  the  man  and  speak  to  him 
of  Christ.  He  set  out  on  this  errand  full  of  that  utter 
and  childlike  faith  which  is  the  most  striking  and  at- 


84  OTHER  SHEEP 

tractive  feature  in  the  character  of  an  Indian  truly  and 
earnestly  converted.  He  went  as  the  first  Apostles  went 
on  their  missions  with  the  good  news  of  a  risen  Christ. 
It  did  not  trouble  him  to  think  of  what  he  should  say; 
it  did  not  occur  to  him  that  his  errand  was  wild  and  im- 
possible. Full  of  quiet  joy,  conscious  of  a  holy  spirit 
leading  him  forward,  he  passed  barefoot  over  the  dusty 
road  with  the  sun  shining  in  his  eyes  through  the  leaves 
and  branches  of  the  forest. 

Half-way  to  the  village  he  encountered  the  devil- wor- 
shipper on  the  road.  His  heart  beat  with  hope  at  this 
coincidence  so  like  an  answer  to  his  prayer.  He  stopped 
him  and  invited  him  to  rest  under  the  shade  of  the  trees. 
The  devil-dancer's  arms  were  full  of  live  fowls  which  he 
was  carrying  to  a  devil's  temple.  He  was  meditating 
on  the  pleasure  of  killing  these  birds  and  smearing  him- 
self with  the  hot  blood.  When  the  Adjutant  learned 
this  business  he  said,  "  Brother,  do  not  do  this  act,  but 
come  with  me  to  my  village  and  let  me  tell  you  in  my 
house  the  wonderful  story  of  Jesus,  Who  has  power  to 
save  all  men  and  to  cast  out  all  devils." 

Greatly  wondering,  the  dancer  consented,  and  the  two 
men  set  out  for  the  Adjutant's  village.  On  the  way  the 
story  of  Jesus  was  told  to  the  devil-worshipper.  He 
listened  with  interest,  asked  a  few  questions,  and  became 
strangely  quiet  and  tranquil  as  the  journey  drew  to  its 
end.  Once  in  the  house,  the  Adjutant  invited  his  friend 
to  pray  with  him.  For  the  first  time  in  his  life,  the 
devil-worshipper  directed  his  thoughts  to  a  God  of 
purity  and  goodness.  They  prayed  together  that  the 
devil  might  be  cast  out  of  the  dancer,  that  he  might  be 
set  free  for  evermore  from  the  powers  of  evil,  and  that 


THE  DEVIL-DANCER  85; 

his  heart  might  become  pure.  Once  and  again  the  man 
cried  out  in  terror  that  he  could  feel  the  devil  coming 
to  take  possession  of  him;  the  Adjutant  answered  these 
cries  by  bidding  him  take  courage  and  pray  with  stronger 
faith  to  the  great  God  over  Whom  neither  man  nor  devil 
could  triumph.  "  Oh,  I  fear  that  the  devil  is  coming !  " 
cried  the  man.  "  No :  keep  praying  to  God ;  the  devil 
will  not  come,"  replied  the  Adjutant.  So  they  prayed, 
these  two  Children  of  India,  in  a  little  mud  hut  on  the 
southern  slopes  of  the  Western  Ghats  whose  palms  are 
stirred  by  breezes  from  the  sea,  prayed  to  the  Father  of 
humanity,  to  the  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  and  to  the  Christ 
of  Calvary,  until  the  sun  was  hidden  and  the  darkness 
of  evening  fell  upon  the  forest.  Throughout  the  day 
they  had  prayed,  and  now  at  eventide  it  was  well  with 
the  man.  Suddenly,  lifting  his  head,  he  cried  out  in  a 
glad  voice  — "  God  has  delivered  me  from  the  power  of 
the  devil !  God  has  come  to  me !  I  can  feel  Him  in  my 
heart." 

This  event  took  place  more  than  a  year  ago.  For 
the  first  two  months  he  was  occasionally  thrown  into  a 
great  fear  by  feeling  that  the  devil  was  approaching 
him.  Instant  and  passionate  prayer  in  every  case 
brought  immediate  relief.  He  was  never  once  tempted 
to  drink  arrack,  to  commit  any  hideous  acts,  or  to  in- 
dulge in  sexual  excesses.  And  now  for  ten  months  he 
has  been  unmolested  by  his  devil  and  wholly  happy  in 
his  heart  and  soul.  If  those  who  have  any  knowledge 
of  the  biting  and  fastening  effect  of  hereditary  supersti- 
tion on  the  mind  of  the  savage  and  ignorant,  will  reflect 
upon  this  instantaneous  change  of  soul,  they  will  con- 
fess, whatever  their  opinion  may  be  as  to  his  possession 


86  OTHER  SHEEP 

by  a  devil,  that  sincere  prayer  to  a  good  God  produces  in 
the  heart  of  a  man  changes  akin  to  miracle. 

He  was  twenty- four  years  of  age  when  the  Salva- 
tionist first  spoke  to  him.  He  was  a  man  famous  in  a 
vast  district,  able  to  live  without  work,  enjoying  a 
notoriety  which  was  flattering  to  his  pride,  and  as  ig- 
norant of  God  as  he  was  abandoned  to  loathsome  and 
filthy  practices.  He  is  now  a  man  between  five-and- 
six-and-twenty.  He  lives  a  life  of  extreme  penury  by 
the  toil  of  field  labour,  earning  a  penny  or  sometimes 
three  half-pence  a  day.  In  his  spare  time  he  goes  among 
those  who  formerly  feared  and  respected  him,  telling 
them  the  story  of  a  Christ  Who  has  delivered  him  from 
the  power  of  all  the  devils  in  hell.  He  has  become 
singularly  sweet  and  gentle.  He  is  clean  in  all  his 
habits,  and  pure  even  in  the  thoughts  of  his  heart.  By 
his  testimony  many  people  hitherto  abandoned  to  devil- 
worship  and  immorality  have  become  converted  to 
Christ.  He  is  something  of  a  saint  and  is  loved  by  an 
increasing  company  of  Christians  in  the  hills  of  Southern 
India. 

One  thing  has  made  a  great  impression  on  him. 
When  he  was  a  child  he  suffered  constantly  from  sick- 
ness and  disease.  When  his  children  were  born  they, 
too,  suffered  in  an  almost  identical  fashion.  But  now, 
for  a  whole  year,  ever  since  the  day  of  his  first  prayer 
to  God,  those  children  have  been  free  of  sickness  and 
pain,  and  he  himself  conscious  of  a  new  delight  in  per- 
fect health.  His  eyes  smile  with  joy  as  he  tells  of  this 
change.  . "  It  is  good  to  believe  in  God,"  he  says,  with 
a  childlike  earnestness  and  simplicity.  He  told  me  it 
never  once  occurred  to  him  that  there  was  any  sin  in 


THE  DEVIL-DANCER  87 

serving  the  devil,  and  that  never  once  did  the  thought  of 
spiritual  punishment  in  the  next  vi^orld  strike  his  mind 
v^ith  dread.  He  felt  himself  to  be  so  entirely  at  the 
mercy  of  an  immense  power  whom  it  was  impossible  to 
resist,  that  he  resigned  himself  will-less  and  unthink- 
ing into  the  arms  of  a  force  too  mighty  for  his  opposi- 
tion and  too  overshadowing  for  any  thought  of  a  good 
God  to  enter  his  mind. 

Never  till  the  Salvationist  met  him  in  the  way  had  he 
thought  of  God,  felt  himself  guilty  and  debased,  or  ex- 
perienced the  smallest  dread  of  death. 

And  now,  as  I  have  said,  he  is  something  of  a  saint, 
is  a  man  of  prayer,  and  a  lay  missionary,  converting  the 
devil-worshippers  of  his  district  to  the  pure  and  beautiful 
religion  of  Jesus  Christ. 


THE  WITCH 

There  is  a  woman  in  Southern  India  whose  weird  ex- 
perience in  demonology  helps  one  in  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury to  understand  certain  mysterious  records  in  the 
Old  and  New  Testaments  which  seem  to  a  superficial 
judgment  quite  unreal  and  wholly  unworthy  of  a  serious 
man's  attention.  It  is  certainly  a  narrative  which  Mr. 
Frederic  Myers  and  Professor  James  would  have  deemed 
w^orthy  of  a  most  careful  examination. 

The  woman  of  whom  I  tell  lives  in  a  poor  and  once 
degraded  village  inhabited  by  Mala  people,  and  belongs 
to  one  of  the  very  lowest  castes.  As  a  child  she  imag- 
ined that  a  Presence  w^as  always  close  at  her  side,  and 
grew  up  in  the  companionship  of  this  mysterious  entity, 
who  not  only  accompanied  her  into  the  rice-fields  or  the 
jungle,  but  who  sat  with  her  at  meals  and  shared  the 
mat  on  which  she  slept  in  the  mud  hut  of  her  parents. 
She  talked,  without  fear  and  without  any  sense  of  the 
unusual,  to  this  friendly  ghost,  consulted  it,  received  an- 
swers from  it,  and  always  guided  her  conduct  by  its  ad- 
vice.    Sometimes  she  would  see  it. 

There  was  nothing  dangerous  or  threatening  in  this 
intimacy,  and  students  of  psychical  science  will  know 
that  quite  healthy  European  children  have  imagined  for 
themselves  an  "  invisible  playmate  " —  an  unseen  com- 
panion to  whom  they  have  talked  aloud,  and  whom  they 
have  professed  even  to  see  in  the  shadows  of  a  shrubbery 


THE  WITCH  89 

or  the  darkness  of  a  corridor.  There  was  in  the  present 
case  nothing  to  mark  out  the  child  either  as  a  privileged 
intimate  of  demons  or  as  an  unbalanced  degenerate. 
She  was  strong  and  healthy.  She  did  her  w^ork  well, 
and  grew  up  with  the  ordinary  ideas  of  a  village  woman. 
Her  parents  found  no  difficulty  in  getting  her  a  hus- 
band. She  bore  children  who  were  physically  efficient 
and  managed  her  household  with  practical  common  sense. 
All  this  time  the  familiar  spirit  was  at  her  side,  harm- 
less, helpful,  and  never  in  the  way.  She  often  asked  his 
advice  about  the  buffaloes,  the  crops,  and  the  children. 

At  the  age  of  thirty-five  she  fell  suddenly  ill.  She 
was  seized  with  a  constant  and  severe  vomiting.  Her 
eyesight  became  dim.  People  seemed  to  her  blurred  and 
indistinct.  She  could  look  without  blinking  into  the 
face  of  the  midday  sun.  In  this  condition,  alike  puz- 
zling to  herself  and  to  her  family,  she  one  day  became 
aware  of  a  greater  nearness  and  a  more  vital  reality  in 
the  familiar  spirit.  Its  presence  became  overwhelmingly 
close;  there  was  a  marked  insistence  in  its  haunting. 
For  the  first  time  in  her  life  she  became  afraid,  but  felt 
herself  powerless  to  resist  this  overshadowing  menace. 
For  the  first  time  she  was  conscious  in  the  friendly 
ghost  of  enmity  and  cruelty. 

One  afternoon,  as  she  lay  trembling  and  apprehensive 
on  her  mat,  the  obsessing  demon  suddenly  sprang  upon 
her,  entered  her  body,  and  took  complete  possession  of 
her  will.  This  is  her  own  language,  as  near  as  I  can 
express  it  in  English;  and  I  would  beg  the  reader  to 
remember  that  whatever  the  explanation  of  the  occur- 
rence may  be,  to  the  woman  herself  it  was  undoubtedly 
a  case  of  demon-possession.     The  critical   reader  will 


90  OTHER  SHEEP 

also  bear  in  mind  that  up  to  this  point  the  woman  was 
perfectly  healthy,  that  she  had  borne  children,  and  that 
she  was  only  five-and-thirty  years  of  age. 

Possessed  by  her  demon,  she  became  either  restored 
to  health  or  quite  indifferent  to  sickness.  She  was  so 
strange  in  manner,  and  so  eloquent  in  her  account  of 
the  event,  that  neither  her  husband  nor  her  neighbours 
doubted  for  a  moment  that  she  was  the  privileged  and 
honoured  darling  of  the  demons.  Her  fame  spread 
through  the  village.  People  came  at  first  to  see  her, 
and  then  to  consult  her.  She  was  sent  for  by  those  w^ho 
had  illness  in  their  house  or  who  wanted  to  avert  some 
disaster  from  their  cattle  or  crops.  She  enjoyed  the 
power  and  notoriety  of  this  new  position,  but  from  the 
very  first  —  on  this  she  is  entirely  clear  and  convinc- 
ingly emphatic  —  she  felt  unhappy  and  distressed  by  the 
divided  occupation  of  her  brain. 

But  consider  the  extraordinary  change  in  her  for- 
tunes. From  being  an  ordinary  low-caste  woman  of 
the  village,  who  worked  for  the  family,  cleaned  the  brass 
vessels  of  the  household,  moulded  cow-dung  into  fire- 
cakes,  worked  in  the  paddy  fields,  fetched  w^ater  from 
the  well,  and  ground  rice  in  the  little  hand-mill  under 
the  veranda  of  her  house,  she  became  so  illustrious  and 
terrible  to  the  whole  country  round  about  that  Brah- 
mans,  who  consider  themselves  as  gods,  actually  wor- 
shipped before  her,  w^hile  people  of  the  highest  caste 
would  remain  for  hours  prostrate  before  her  house. 
She  was  practically  deified.  And  she  could  gain  all  the 
rice  and  dahl  necessary  for  her  family's  subsistence 
merely  by  surrendering  herself  to  trances  and  letting 
the  demon  say  what  he  could  through  her  lips.     She  be- 


THE  WITCH  91 

came  what  the  Bible  calls  a  Witch  and  what  psychical 
science  calls  a  Medium. 

For  six  years  she  enjoyed  an  unequalled  glory  in  those 
parts  of  India  as  an  oracle  and  a  healer.  She  cured  the 
sick,  she  raised  the  ail-but  dead,  she  prevented  disaster, 
and  she  uttered  counsel  which  brought  good-fortune. 
But  all  these  six  years  were  marked  for  her  by  an  in- 
creasing wretchedness  of  mind  and  by  a  disquiet  of  soul 
which  became  at  last  utterly  intolerable.  She,  the  ora- 
cle and  chief  power  of  her  village,  she,  a  witch  famous 
in  all  that  part  of  India,  would  wander  away  from  her 
home  and  seek  advice  from  the  most  humble  and  de- 
graded devil-dancers  as  to  getting  rid  of  her  infernal 
Control.  She  performed  every  magic  for  this  purpose, 
faithfully  obeyed  a  hundred  superstitious  rites,  and  by 
fasting  and  supplication  sought  to  oust  the  mastering 
devil  from  her  body.  But  in  vain.  She  drove  stakes 
into  the  ground  and  made  rings  about  her  house,  in 
order  that  the  devil  should  not  be  able  to  reach  her; 
but,  so  she  declares,  he  w^ould  spring  upon  her  from 
the  roof,  and  getting  possession  of  her,  would  fling  her 
to  the  ground  and  tear  her  with  a  ferocious  revenge. 
She  was  obliged  to  go  where  this  devil  urged  her,  to 
do  w^hat  he  commanded,  and  to  say  what  he  said. 

Not  very  far  from  her  ow^n  dwelling  was  a  little  village 
where  the  Salvation  Army  had  set  up  its  banner  of 
Liberation.  She  had  heard  of  Christ  as  "  One  to  Whom 
people  prayed  in  trouble."  She  had  no  further  knowl- 
edge of  Christianity,  and  was  entirely  imacquainted  with 
the  story  of  Christ's  life.  He  was  to  her  only  "  one  of 
the  gods." 

It  occurred  to  her,  in  a  mood  of  utter  dejection,  that 


92  OTHER  SHEEP 

she  should  make  trial  of  this  new  God.  She  said 
nothing  to  her  family,  but  set  out  one  day  for  the 
village  occupied  by  the  Salvationists.  When  she  ar- 
rived she  found  a  meeting  in  progress.  She  entered  the 
hall,  and  advanced  to  the  platform.  One  who  was 
present  tells  me  that  the  poor  miserable  woman  appeared 
to  be  dazed  and  unconscious,  like  a  sleep-walker,  that 
when  she  reached  the  platform  she  suddenly  uttered  a 
scream  which  was  perfectly  ''  soul-thrilling,"  fell  down 
upon  her  knees,  and  seizing  the  feet  of  one  of  the  Salva- 
tionists, held  them  in  a  vice  of  iron  and  remained  in  that 
posture,  shaken  by  a  violent  convulsion,  for  fifteen  min- 
utes. 

She  was  praying,  but  she  does  not  remember  what 
entreaty  left  her  soul  or  what  happened  to  her.  No 
one  had  spoken.  Nothing  had  been  preached  to  touch 
her  heart.  No  hymn  had  been  sung  to  open  a  door  for 
her  into  the  way  of  peace.  But  she  felt  conscious  of 
restoration,  of  something  that  gave  her  freedom,  above 
all  things  of  a  new  and  delicious  independence  of  her 
demon.  The  mere  prostration  before  this  God  who 
was  kind  to  people  in  trouble  brought  her  a  sense  of 
relief. 

''  I  was  never  afraid  after  that,"  she  declares.  "  The 
demon  used  to  come  to  me,  but  he  did  not  speak." 

Christianity,  be  it  remembered,  was  at  this  time  as 
foreign  to  her  understanding  as  the  literature  of  Greece 
or  the  text-books  of  physical  science. 

Some  few  weeks  after  this  occurrence,  she  was  one 
day  gathering  wood  in  the  jungle,  when  she  felt  herself 
moved  as  by  some  unseen  power  to  kneel  down  then 
and  there,  and  beseech  Christ  to  rid  her  once  and  for 


THE  WITCH  93 

ever  of  that  devil's  presence.  "  I  did  not  knov/  that 
Christ  had  ever  cast  out  devils,"  she  says,  "  all  I  knew 
at  that  time  was  His  Name,  and  that  people  in  trouble 
prayed  to  Him ;  nothing  more." 

Surrendering  herself  to  this  inexplicable  and  sudden 
inclination,  the  poor  gatherer  of  sticks  kneeled  down  in 
the  solitudes  of  the  jungle,  and  prayed  calmly  and  ar- 
ticulately to  Christ  for  succour  and  complete  liberation 
from  the  menace  of  evil. 

On  the  instant,  she  says,  the  haunting  spirit  left  her. 

Amazement  was  followed  by  joy,  and  joy  thrilled  and 
swelled  in  her  breast,  till  it  became  a  glorious  gratitude 
and  a  passionate  adoration.  She  had  not  lost  a  devil. 
She  had  found  a  god.  Somewhere  in  the  blue  heavens 
lived  One  named  Christ  Who  was  able  to  perform 
extraordinary  magic.  Who  listened  when  the  heart 
cried  to  Him,  and  Who  felt  compassion  for  the  wretched 
and  the  sorrowful.  This  was  all.  She  knew  nothing 
of  a  virgin  birth,  certainly  nothing  of  an  immaculate 
conception,  nothing  of  the  Lake  of  Galilee,  the  Mount 
of  Olives,  Calvary,  the  garden  sepulchre,  the  road  to 
Emmaus,  and  the  road  to  Damascus.  Nothing  of  theol- 
ogy, nothing  even  of  Christianity.  She  was  neither 
baptized  nor  confirmed.  Of  such  a  book  as  the  Bible 
she  had  never  heard.  Christ,  for  her,  was  one  of  the 
gods,  but  one  to  Whom  people  in  trouble  prayed;  and 
out  of  her  great  wretchedness  and  with  a  very  willing 
surrender  of  her  whole  being,  she  had  prayed,  and  the 
prayer  had  been  answered. 

It  was  with  wonder  unspeakable  that  she  learned  the 
earth-story  of  Christ  from  the  Salvationists  to  whom 
she  carried  in  a  joyous  gratitude  the  news  of  her  deliv- 


94 


OTHER  SHEEP 


erance.  She  was  spell-bound  by  the  simple  beauty  and 
the  poignant  tragedy  of  that  story.  Converted  already, 
for  nothing  will  shake  her  from  the  certainty  that  she 
gave  her  soul  to  Christ  alone  in  the  jungle,  she  became 
a  Christian,  and  went  back  to  her  village  with  the 
supreme  intention  of  telling  others  the  good  news  of 
Liberation. 

You  can  imagine  how  different  now  the  village  seemed 
in  her  eyes.  She  had  embraced  the  idea  of  a  God  who 
is  Good;  she  had  perceived  religion  as  something  defi- 
nitely concerned  with  the  moral  advancement  of  human- 
ity. In  her  village,  devils  were  worshipped  out  of  fear, 
gods  were  ceremonially  served  for  material  prosperity, 
and  no  one  paid  the  very  smallest  attention  to  morality. 
It  was  a  little  habitation  of  men  and  women,  sunken  in 
iniquity  and  practising  unspeakable  abominations  with- 
out shame  and  without  the  least  idea  of  any  need  for 
reformation. 

The  Witch,  seeing  all  these  accustomed  things  with 
new  eyes,  set  herself  to  teach  the  people  our  pure  religion 
breathing  household  laws.  But  she,  before  whom 
Brahmans  had  prostrated  themselves,  and  to  whom  evil 
had  been  a  power  and  an  autocracy,  found  herself  now 
as  a  virtuous  and  God-loving  woman,  the  scorn  and 
derision  of  all  the  people.  Those  who  had  kneeled  to 
her,  treated  her  now  as  "  untouchable  " ;  those  who  had 
feared  and  trembled  before  her,  mocked  her  with  the 
vilest  and  most  contemptuous  taunts. 

This  little  Sodom,  this  miniature  Gomorrah  of  South- 
ern India,  remained  indifferent  to  the  religion  of  Chris- 
tianity, and  continued  in   its  hideous   iniquity   and   its 


THE  WITCH  95 

odious  superstition,  blind  to  the  miracle  accomplished  in 
the  Witch,  deaf  to  her  entreaties,  and  careless  of  her 
warnings. 

A  Salvationist  who  worked  in  the  place  at  that  time 
said  to  me,  "  It  was  an  immoral,  bad  village ;  our  few 
converts  were  no  credit  to  us ;  the  people  seemed  incapa- 
ble of  spiritual  birth;  the  whole  thing  was  thoroughly 
unsatisfactory."  And  yet,  surely  a  light  from  heaven 
had  shone  into  its  darkness. 

Some  three  years  ago  cholera  appeared  in  this  village. 
Like  an  avenger  from  the  outraged  heavens,  it  swept 
away  the  ringleaders  of  evil,  and  filled  the  rest  of  the 
people  with  an  agony  of  terror.  In  this  condition  of  panic 
—  a  state  which  cannot  be  imagined  by  Europeans  —  they 
did  not  seek  devil-dancers  and  they  did  not  kneel  to  their 
idols,  but  once  more  they  prostrated  themselves  before 
the  Witch  and  implored  her  to  supplicate  her  good  and 
holy  God  on  their  behalf.  It  is  a  very  remarkable  and 
significant  fact  that  these  people,  who  were  perfectly 
sincere  in  their  superstitions,  and  genuinely  contemptu- 
ous of  Christianity,  turned  to  the  Christian  God  in  the 
hour  of  their  extremity. 

The  Witch  bade  them  repent  of  their  many  and 
grievous  sins,  taught  them  to  pray,  and  in  the  open 
village  street,  the  rest  kneeling  beside  her,  besought  God 
on  their  behalf.  Her  prayers,  I  am  told,  were  of  ex- 
traordinary beauty.  She  always  began  —  her  eyes 
raised  to  heaven  and  her  arms  uplifted  —  with  the 
words,  whispered  in  an  imploring  tenderness  — '*  O 
God,  You  are  my  Father !  —  my  Father!  " 

The  scourge  continued  to  afflict  the  village.     Sixty 


96  OTHER  SHEEP 

deaths  had  occurred  when  she  said  to  her  husband, 
''  Let  us  leave  this  house  and  go  into  the  fields,  and  build 
a  gudisha."  So  they  went  out,  and  built  the  little 
shelter,  and  by  seven  o'clock  in  the  evening  it  was  fin- 
ished. She  had  prepared  the  evening  meal,  her  husband 
and  her  son  had  eaten,  when  of  a  sudden  she  pressed  her 
hand  to  her  side  and  said,  "  It  has  come  to  me !  I  be- 
lieve I  have  got  it !  "  No  sooner  were  the  words  ut- 
tered than  she  was  seized  with  convulsions,  her  limbs 
contracted,  and  she  was  gripped  by  an  agony  indescriba- 
bly dreadful.  In  a  few  minutes  she  was  lying  stifif  and 
full  length  upon  the  ground.  The  husband  stooped 
down  and  touched  her  feet.  "  They  are  cold,"  he  mur- 
mured, trembling  with  fear;  then  he  touched  her  limp 
hands :  "  She  is  dead,"  he  whispered,  getting  on  his 
feet;  ''come,  we  cannot  stop  here."  Father  and  son, 
stricken  Avith  a  great  fear,  moved  away,  and  spent  the 
night  under  a  tree  some  quarter  of  a  mile  from  the 
woman  and  the  cholera. 

Early  in  the  morning,  on  his  way  to  the  village  for 
a  burying  spade,  the  son,  passing  by  his  mother,  looked 
at  her,  and  saw  that  her  eyes  were  open.  He  drew 
nearer,  and  said,  "  I  thought  you  were  dead."  She 
motioned  to  him  to  come  nearer  still,  and  said  with 
great  eagerness :  "  Go  to  our  house,  and  in  a  pot  tied 
to  the  roof  you  will  find  five  rupees ;  bring  them  to  me 
here."  The  son  went  on  this  errand  and  returned  with 
the  money.  "  Tie  it  up  in  my  cloth,"  said  the  woman, 
and  when  this  was  done  she  appeared  to  be  at  peace, 
and  sank  into  a  quiet  sleep. 

After  several  days  she  became  quite  well,  and  was 
able  to  work  in  the  fields,  to  do  her  household  duties, 


THE  WITCH  97 

and  help  her  neighbours.  For  six  weeks  she  went  about 
these  duties,  the  money  always  tied  up  in  the  corner  of 
her  cloth. 

Then  came  the  Harvest  Festival,  when  the  Salvation- 
ists give  what  they  can  of  their  pice  and  annas,  their 
rice  and  their  dahl,  for  the  conversion  of  India.  The 
Witch  was  the  first  to  rise  with  her  offering,  and  her 
offering  was  the  amazing  sum  of  five  rupees,  which  she 
took  from  a  corner  of  her  sari.  She  was  asked  how  she 
came  to  give  so  liberally,  and  she  told  the  following  nar- 
rative. 

When  she  had  been  deserted  by  husband  and  son  — 
dimly  conscious  that  she  was  deserted  —  a  feeling  of 
intense  and  most  wretched  loneliness  overcame  her 
senses,  and  she  thought  how  bitter  it  was  to  die  alone. 
The  sun  had  set;  the  day  stood  at  the  gate  of  twilight 
waiting  for  the  stars ;  over  the  sad  earth,  gradually  losing 
outline  and  colour,  fell  the  grey  shadow  of  impending 
darkness ;  on  the  air  came  to  her  a  coldness,  an  indift'er- 
ence,  an  isolation.  To  die  alone  —  how  bitter  and  how 
hard!  In  the  extremity  of  her  weakness,  from  the 
depths  of  the  swoon  that  held  her  soul,  she  sought 
despairingly  for  life  and  another  sunrise.  To  live,  to 
feel  the  morning  light,  and  to  see  fellow-creatures, 
to  be  one  of  many  in  the  sunshine  of  familiar  earth  — 
this  became  a  hunger  and  thirst  to  the  woman  dying  of 
cholera  in  the  falling  night,  forsaken  and  alone. 

"  Then,"  she  tells,  "  I  thought  to  myself  —  I  will  pray 
to  Jesus ;  and  with  the  thought  came  the  idea  that  I  should 
promise  Him  an  offering.  I  thought,  '  What  can  I  give 
Him  ?  '  And  I  remembered  that  in  a  pot  hung  from  the 
roof  of  my  house  were  five  rupees  which  I  had  saved 


98  OTHER  SHEEP 

towards  buying  a  milk  buffalo.  I  said  to  myself,  *  I 
will  offer  God  these  five  rupees  and  ask  Him  not  to  let 
me  die  alone  in  the  cold  night/  So  I  began  to  pray; 
but  as  I  was  praying  I  saw  a  vision,  and  forgot  my 
prayer  and  my  offering  in  the  wonder  of  the  vision. 
For  I  saw  as  clearly  as  if  they  had  been  real  people,  two 
Salvationists  approaching  me  out  of  the  shadows,  and 
one  of  them  came  quite  close  to  me  and  opened  a 
Bible  and  began  to  read  to  me,  and  then  he  closed  the 
Bible  and  knelt  down  at  my  side  and  prayed  for  me; 
afterwards  he  rose,  whispered  to  the  other,  and  looking 
back  at  me  for  a  moment,  disappeared  into  the  dark- 
ness. As  they  passed  out  of  sight  I  fell  asleep,  for  the 
reading  and  prayer  had  given  me  peace,  and  I  lay  like 
that  till  morning.  As  soon  as  I  woke  I  remembered  the 
vision,  and  when  my  son  came  to  me  I  sent  him  for  the 
five  rupees,  and  ever  since  then  I  kept  them,  waiting  for 
the  Harvest." 

The  village  is  at  this  day  almost  entirely  Christian,  and 
the  former  Witch  is  a  transforming  and  redeeming  power 
throughout  that  whole  district.  Whatever  be  the  expla- 
nation of  her  possession,  the  story  set  down  in  this  place 
is  the  deposition  of  a  woman  as  holy  and  as  powerful 
for  righteousness  as  any  female  saint  in  the  Roman  Cal- 
endar. 


DEVIL-PRIESTS 

The  whole  subject  of  demonology  is  full  of  difficulty 
for  the  student  who  is  at  once  catholic  in  his  research 
and  unbiassed  in  his  judgment  by  the  easy  verdicts  of 
nineteenth  century  science.  He  naturally  shrinks  from 
the  idea  that  invisible  and  disembodied  entities  haunt 
the  earth  seeking  human  tenements  as  means  for  ex- 
pressing their  passion  and  their  lust.  He  knows  that 
while  the  oldest  of  records  bear  witness  to  the  existence 
of  witches  and  that  while  the  savage  races  of  the  earth 
still  bow  themselves  in  terror  before  a  devil-possessed 
person,  the  evidence  for  such  a  mystery  among  civilized 
nations  dwindles  down  to  a  few  cases  of  m.ore  or  less 
genuine  mediums  who  professed  to  be  "  controlled  "  in 
trance  by  spirits  from  another  plane  of  existence.  The 
great  thesis  of  Frederic  Myers  does  not  solve  the  prob- 
lem. The  madhouses  of  Europe  do  not  offer  any  in- 
telligible explanation.  He  acknowledges  that  by  far  the 
greatest  number  of  human  beings  still  have  affiance  in 
devil-possession,  but  shelters  himself  against  belief  in 
any  such  irrational  and  distressing  theory  behind  the 
solid  testimony  of  enlightened  and  progressive  nations 
that  devil-possession  does  not  occur. 

And  yet,  in  such  a  country  as  India,  where  the  belief  in 
devils  is  universal  and  where  he  may  see  for  himself  many 
strange  and  shaking  things  among  the  devil-worshippers, 
the  student  must  sometimes  be  tempted  to  believe  that 

99 


loo  OTHER  SHEEP 

there  is  at  least  some  Power  in  the  universe  definitely 
evil  whose  work  in  the  world,  however  effected,  is  ac- 
complished through  human  instruments.  And  he  may 
be  led  by  his  inclination  towards  this  belief,  to  wonder 
whether  those  numerous  instances  among  civilized  na- 
tions of  rational  men  and  women  driven  against  their 
wills  to  alcoholism,  to  kleptomania,  and  to  unaccountable 
violence,  as  well  as  those  more  multitudinous  instances  of 
men  and  women  otherwise  sane,  consciously  yielding  their 
wills  to  disfiguring  vices,  to  brutalities  towards  children, 
and  to  the  spiritual  debasements  of  unintelligent  vul- 
garity, are  not  in  some  way  or  another  expressions  of  the 
activity  of  that  same  malevolent  Power  whose  manifesta- 
tions among  savage  people  it  is  easier  to  define  but  not 
more  easy  to  explain. 

After  many  close  and  careful  conversations  with  devil- 
worshippers  in  India,  I  find  myself  less  inclined  to  dog- 
matize upon  this  subject  than  was  .the  case  with  me  a 
year  ago.  But  I  do  feel  at  least  certain  of  this,  that  it 
is  as  easy  to  find  among  civilized  nations  baffling  in- 
stances of  wills  over-ridden  by  exterior  Evil,  as  cases 
in  India  of  demon-possession  which  to  the  victims  them- 
selves, even  after  the  purifying  and  uplifting  experience 
of  Christianity,  appear  to  be  incapable  of  other  explana- 
tion. 

In  the  following  narrations  the  reader  will  find  ample 
evidence  for  believing  that  at  least  it  is  supremely  haz- 
ardous for  any  human  will  to  surrender  itself  to  the  idea 
of  Evil  —  whether  such  a  force  has  entity  or  not,  and 
whether  the  surrender  be  definitely  made  or  merely  rest 
in  a  treacherous  inclination.  With  certainty  we  may 
say,  in  spite  of  brazen  lungs  raised  in  Europe  against  the 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  loi 

decalogue  and  the  moral  code,  that  the  path  of  evolving 
humanity  is  beset  by  no  greater  danger  than  the  tempta- 
tions towards  anything  which  is  not  absolutely  and 
strenuously  good. 

This  man  was  not  a  devil-dancer,  but  a  devil-priest. 
He  is  handsome  in  appearance,  not  unlike  Tennyson. 
The  long  thick  iron-grey  hair  is  combed  back  from  the 
head  and  curls  outward  from  the  nape  of  the  neck:  the 
moustache  and  beard  are  likewise  iron-grey.  In  spite 
of  a  particularly  black  skin,  the  fine-cut  leatures  arid  the 
large  eyes  bring  him  closer  to  the  European  than  is  the 
case  with  many  Indians  of  lighter  complexions.  He 
has  a  pleasant  expression  and  the  whole  character  of  his 
face  is  one  of  a  lofty  spirituality.  It  was  odd  to  see 
this  noble-looking  man  sitting  cross-legged  on  the  floor 
of  my  rest-house  at  Nagercoil.  He  refused  a  chair,  sat 
himself  on  the  ground,  and  with  hands  folded  in  his  lap, 
raised  his  eyes  to  mine  and  awaited  questions.  While 
we  talked,  lizards  ran  about  the  whitewashed  walls,  and 
from  the  dusty  garden  outside  came  the  monotonous  cry 
of  the  hoopoe. 

He  told  me  that  his  father  had  been  a  devil-dancer, 
but  that  he  himself  had  begun  life  as  an  assistant  in 
the  temple  raised  to  this  devil's  honour.  The  devil  was 
a  female  named  Ammon.  Her  worship  is  not  so  repul- 
sive as  that  of  the  male  devil  Cholamarden,  whose  dan- 
cers in  their  loathsome  frenzy  eat  the  raw  heart  and 
steaming  entrails  of  a  pig  in  addition  to  drinking  its 
blood;  but  the  effect  of  her  worship  is  disastrous  to  mo- 
rality. Children  of  eight  and  nine  years  of  age,  he  told 
me,  are  absolutely  corrupt.  Disease  of  a  terrible  nature 
ravages  the  whole  country.     "  I  remember  a  boy,"  he 


I02  OTHER  SHEEP 

told  me,  "  who  once  saw  a  caste  girl  going  to  market  and 
dragged  her  off  to  the  jungle;  she  was  obliged  to  go  to 
the  hospital,  and  she  was  only  nine  years  of  age;  the  boy 
was  twenty.  Do  you  wonder  why  Indians  cling  to  their 
custom  of  early  marriage?  These  child  marriages  re- 
lieve the  parents'  anxiety.     Immorality  is  universal." 

In  the  temple  of  Amnion,  he  told  me,  there  is  an  outer 
court  to  which  people  come  with  offerings  of  camphor, 
coco-nuts,  plantains,  rice,  fried  fish,  and  other  things. 
The  assistant  takes  these  gifts  and  carries  them  into  the 
inner  court,  where  the  priest  offers  them  to  the  goddess. 
During  this  service  in  the  "  holy  of  holies,"  the  people 
in  the  outer  court  give  themselves  up  to  the  very  vilest 
and  most  disgusting  immoralities,  using  all  the  time  the 
foulest  language  imaginable,  and  utterly  abandoning 
themselves  to  an  orgy  of  iniquity.  It  is  implicitly  be- 
lieved that  this  orgy,  so  delightful  and  exciting  to  them- 
selves, is  pleasing  to  Ammon. 

At  harvest  time  the  temple  becomes  a  hell.  For  eight 
days  the  priest  must  remain  in  the  darkness  of  the  inner 
court  and  never  go  outside  for  any  purpose  whatever. 
Every  family  must  contribute  two  rupees  to  the  festival. 
The  gifts  of  fruit,  vegetables,  and  fish  are  afterwards 
divided  among  the  people,  who  fill  the  outer  court  with 
the  shrieks  and  yells  of  their  maddened  lust.  The  devil- 
dancers,  excited  by  arrack  and  encouraged  by  tom-toms, 
hand-clappings,  and  shouts  of  applause,  whirl  themselves 
into  a  condition  of  anaesthesia  in  which  burning  oil  does 
not  blister  the  palms  of  their  hands.  Men,  women,  and 
children  are  driven  mad  by  an  ecstasy  of  faith  in  the 
physical  power  of  their  devil-goddess.  To  her  they 
scream  their  hymns  of  praise,  for  her  they  fling  them- 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  103 

selves  upon  the  ground,  and  to  give  her  —  their  pro- 
tectress and  providence  —  pleasure  and  amusement  they 
commit  a  hundred  lurid  and  filthy  obscenities  prompted 
by  the  whirling  inspiration  of  the  orgy. 

As  devil-priest,  the  man  of  whom  I  am  writing  re- 
ceived a  double  portion  of  all  the  gifts  brought  to  the 
temple,  and  without  labour  of  any  kind  he  lived  the  proud 
and  indolent  life  of  a  spiritual  autocrat.  It  pleased  him, 
he  told  me,  to  encounter  Indian  Christians  and  to  taunt 
them  with  the  power  of  his  devil-goddess.  He  did  not 
understand  Christianity,  but  he  knew  that  Christians 
worshipped  some  god  or  other  whose  mildness  and 
feebleness  caused  him  an  infinite  amusement.  Could  any 
of  the  Christians  dance  for  hours,  drink  the  blood  of  a 
dying  pig,  jump  into  a  fire,  or  take  burning  oil  of  cam- 
phor into  their  hands?  "Your  God,"  he  used  to  say 
contemptuously,  "  is  not  so  powerful  as  my  goddess." 

He  was  not  a  drunkard,  as  so  many  worshippers  of 
evil  are,  but  he  was  given  up  to  immoralities  as  much 
for  their  own  satisfaction  as  out  of  deference  to  his  god- 
dess. It  never  once  occurred  to  him  all  his  life  that 
there  was  anything  in  these  practices  either  hateful  or 
bad. 

He  was  a  grown  man,  married,  and  the  father  of  a  son, 
when  an  incident  happened  which  altered  the  whole  course 
of  his  life.  He  was  alone  in  the  temple  one  day,  offer- 
ing incense  to  his  demon,  when  the  noise  of  rolling 
drums  outside  diverted  his  attention  from  the  altar.  To 
see  what  the  noise  meant,  he  left  his  offerings  on  the  mud 
table,  passed  into  the  outer  court,  and  made  his  way  to 
the  door.  As  he  came  into  the  bright  sunshine  he  saw 
a  company  of  Indians  dressed  in  a  similar  native  dress. 


I04  OTHER  SHEEP 

congregated  at  a  corner  of  the  street,  with  a  flag  in  their 
centre,  and  a  number  of  boys  playing  drums  round  the 
lifted  banner.  He  recognized  them  as  a  new  force  on 
the  side  of  Christianity  of  whom  people  had  lately  been 
talking  in  those  parts,  a  body  of  people,  white  and  black, 
who  called  themselves  Salvationists. 

Out  of  curiosity  the  priest  crossed  the  red  dust  of  the 
road  and  stood  with  the  crowd  of  amused  neighbours 
who  had  now  gathered  round  this  fresh  excitement  in 
their  lives.  The  drums  ceased.  The  Salvationists 
sang  a  hymn  which  did  not  convey  any  definite  idea  to 
the  devil-priest;  and  then  one  of  their  number,  a  native 
of  high  caste,  began  to  speak.  He  talked  about  a  God 
Who  demanded  from  man,  not  sacrifices  and  not  im- 
moralities, but  a  cleansed  heart  and  a  soul  determined  to 
righteousness.  He  declared  that  this  good  and  holy  God 
had  an  enemy,  and  that  the  work  of  this  enemy  was  evil. 
To  please  the  good  God,  to  secure  His  help  and  to  enter 
His  heaven,  it  was  first  of  all  necessary  for  a  man  to 
repent  of  his  sins,  to  listen  to  the  voice  of  his  conscience, 
and  to  decide  that  henceforth  he  would  commit  no  act 
and  entertain  no  thought  which  the  voice  of  his  con- 
science declared  to  be  either  definitely  wicked  or  un- 
worthy of  a  child  of  God. 

The  devil-priest  walked  away  with  two  new  thoughts 
in  his  mind.  He  conceived  the  possibility  of  a  God  Who 
was  perfectly  good.  He  saw  definitely  that  there  was 
such  a  thing  as  sin. 

"For  many  days,"  he  told  me,  "I  could  not  free 
myself  from  these  new  thoughts,  which  haunted  me.  I 
felt  they  were  true.  I  did  not  doubt  my  former  beliefs, 
but  I  felt  that  these  two  ideas  of  the  Salvationists  were 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  105 

true.  A  good  God  —  and  Sin.  Sin  which  endangered 
the  soul  and  made  it  impossible  for  it  to  be  happy  and 
safe  after  death.  I  became  afraid.  I  thought  to  my- 
self, God  may  be  more  powerful  than  Ammon.  God 
is  a  hater  of  sin.  Ammon  is  a  lover  of  sin.  Goodness 
and  Evil  —  those  two ;  which  is  the  stronger  ?  I  felt 
sure,  though  I  cannot  tell  you  how,  that  Goodness  was 
stronger  than  Evil.  For  a  whole  month  I  fought  a  bat- 
tle in  my  soul.  I  would  go  to  the  Salvationists  at  their 
meetings,  hear  what  they  said,  and  then  return  to  my 
temple,  and  in  the  darkness  of  the  altar  struggle  to  think 
it  out.  Some  of  the  officers  would  say  to  me  — *  Come 
and  test  our  God;  come  and  try  Him;  see  if  He  is  able 
to  do  vv^hat  we  say  He  can  do.'  And  although  I  had 
begun  to  long  for  a  cleansed  heart,  and  although  I  felt 
a  great  longing  to  be  free  of  sin  and  different  from  what 
I  was,  I  refused  this  challenge  and  remained  a  priest  of 
Ammon  —  because  I  was  afraid  of  her.  At  last,  so  strong 
was  the  longing  for  liberation,  I  determined  to  ask  Am- 
mon herself  whether  I  should  become  a  Christian  or 
stay  as  her  priest.  I  feared  to  try  the  Salvationists' 
God;  I  felt  that  it  would  be  safer  to  get  guidance  from 
*the  goddess  of  my  fathers.  So  one  day,  I  offered  in- 
cense to  Ammon,  prostrated  myself  before  the  altar,  and 
besought  her  to  tell  me  in  a  vision  what  I  should  do.  I 
waited  for  hours.  There  was  no  vision;  there  was  no 
sign.  For  the  first  time,  out  of  a  great  necessity,  I  had 
sought  help  from  my  goddess,  and  she  remained  indiffer- 
ent. I  rose  from  my  knees,  and  I  said  to  myself,  '  There 
is  no  life  in  this  goddess;  why,  then,  should  I  serve  her?  ' 
I  went  straight  out  of  the  temple,  sought  the  Salvationists, 
and  gave  myself  to  God.     What  happened  to  me  at  that 


io6  OTHER  SHEEP 

moment  I  cannot  describe ;  I  saw  no  bright  light,  I  heard 
no  voice,  and  I  was  not  conscious  of  any  unseen  Pres- 
ence at  my  side  —  but  I  felt  that  some  wonderful  Power 
had  entered  into  me  and  had  completely  changed  me.  I 
seemed  all  at  once  to  be  different  from  what  I  had  been 
up  to  that  very  moment,  and  above  everything  else  I  felt 
happy  in  the  love  of  a  good  and  merciful  God." 

This  was  in  the  year  1892.  Ever  since  that  day  this 
once  lazy  and  arrogant  priest,  subjected  to  frightful  per- 
secution from  the  Sudras,  has  earned  his  own  living  as 
a  humble  cultivator,  has  worked  without  pay  for  the 
Salvation  Army,  has  given  liberally  to  its  funds,  and  has 
always  devoted  one  day  in  every  week  —  a  great  sacri- 
fice to  the  struggling  Indian  —  to  worship  of  God  and 
meditation  on  His  way  of  liberation. 

I  asked  him  if  he  had  ever  experienced  dreams  of 
terror  since  his  change  of  life,  or  seen  visions  which  gave 
him  strength  and  consolation. 

"  Devils  have  come  many  times,"  he  replied,  quietly, 
"  to  torment  me  in  my  dreams.  I  have  never  seen  a 
vision  from  heaven.  But  I  do  not  fear  the  devils.  T 
am  so  sure  of  God.  He  has  answered  my  prayers,  and 
He  has  given  me " —  his  face  became  lighted  with  a 
smile  of  happiness  — "  complete  peace  of  heart." 

"  Will  you  give  me  an  instance  of  your  answered 
prayer  ?  " 

"  Very  willingly.  The  cholera  came  to  us,  and  my 
son  was  brought  to  the  edge  of  death.  No  one  thought 
he  would  recover.  The  doctor  had  given  up  hope.  I 
prayed  to  God.  I  said,  '  He  is  my  only  son.  Spare 
him  a  little  longer  and  I  will  be  thankful  to  Thee  —  so 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  107 

thankful,  O  my  Father.'  God  heard  that  cry.  He  saved 
my  child." 

They  told  me  that  the  father  came  to  the  next  meeting 
of  the  Salvationists,  and  gave  seven  rupees  as  a  thank- 
offering  for  this  answered  prayer. 

Perhaps  of  all  the  converts  from  devil-worship  to 
Christianity  none  impressed  me  so  much  as  the  old  and 
beautiful  man  known  now  over  a  wide  district  of  South- 
ern India  as  the  Saint  of  Manady. 

To  see  him  is  to  feel  an  instant  reverence ;  to  speak  with 
him,  even  through  an  interpreter,  is  to  grow  strangely 
and  humbly  fond  of  him.  For  in  this  tall  old  stooping 
man,  thin  as  a  lath  and  bowed  with  something  more  than 
years,  one  is  conscious  of  a  spirit  awed  into  the  wonder- 
ing simplicity  of  childhood  by  communion  with  the  Eter- 
nal. He  is  a  saint,  and  a  saint  who  has  seen  God.  He 
does  not  seem  to  belong  to  the  earth ;  he  appears  to  have 
risen  into  a  state  of  being  which  is  higher  than  humanity. 
And  yet  there  is  in  the  large  eyes  and  the  shrinking 
body,  something  timorous  and  dog-like,  as  though  a  faith 
greater  than  anything  demanded  by  religion  has  arrested 
and  atrophied  his  reason.  At  one  moment  the  soul 
kneels  to  him;  at  the  next  the  intellect  feels  compassion 
for  him. 

Tall,  thin,  even  emaciated,  with  mild  and  beautiful 
lips,  eyes  that  are  full  of  wonder,  a  brow  ploughed  with 
the  deep  furrows  of  solitude  and  meditation,  this  gra- 
cious and  childlike  patriarch  of  the  Tamils  shrinks  from 
the  world,  covers  his  face  with  humility  in  approaching  a 
European,  and  stoops  to  kiss  the  hand  of  those  from 
whose  race  he  has  received  the  gift  of  God.     Leaning 


io8  OTHER  SHEEP 

on  his  long  staff,  naked  save  for  his  loin  cloth,  he  re- 
minded me  of  Ulysses  returning  beggared  to  the  gates 
of  Ithaca.  The  short,  grey  hair  comes  forward  to  the 
brow;  the  moustache  and  beard  only  just  cover  lip  and 
chin;  the  mild  eyes,  eloquent  of  suffering  and  aspiration 
and  visions,  are  habitually  bent  upon  the  dust;  the  ears 
stand  away  from  the  head;  the  neck  is  like  a  cord;  the 
long,  lean  body,  with  the  hollow  breast  and  stooping 
knees,  witnesses  to  suffering,  patience,  and  privation.  I 
have  never  seen  any  man's  gestures  so  beautiful  and  so 
entirely  sincere  as  the  awe-filled  gestures  of  humility  with 
which  this  wandering  man  of  prayer  greets  and  takes 
leave  of  a  stranger. 

He  told  me  that  he  remembers  quite  well  how  his  par- 
ents used  to  say,  "  We  must  worship  God."  He  would 
go  as  a  child  to  the  river,  bathe  himself,  and  then  enter- 
ing a  Hindu  temple  would  say,  "  God,  God,  God," — 
not  knowing  what  the  word  meant.  Four  vices  marked 
his  childhood  —  drinking,  lying,  stealing,  and  lust.  He 
indulged  in  these  vices  while  he  obeyed  all  the  ceremonial 
instructions  of  the  priest.  Religion  was  nothing  but  a 
form.  He  had  not  the  smallest  notion  of  a  good  God, 
was  never  told  that  his  bad  habits  were  sinful. 

His  first  faith  was  in  a  devil.  At  the  age  of  twenty- 
five  or  twenty-six  he  was  appointed  a  priest  in  a  temple 
devoted  to  propitiating  twenty  of  these  wicked  gods. 
As  priest  his  duty  lay  in  guarding  the  vestments  and 
vessels,  the  swords  and  bells,  which  were  kept  for  festi- 
vals in  the  inner  court  of  the  temple;  he  it  was  who 
purified  them  with  ceremonies  and  ashes  and  gave  them 
to  the  devil-dancers  in  the  outer  court,  which  was 
always  crowded  on  high  days  with  an  excited  and  evil- 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  109 

minded  congregation.  In  the  inner  court  were  many 
idols  and  shrines;  the  people  would  bring  for  offerings 
to  their  idols,  coco-nuts,  plantains,  flowers,  oil,  and  in- 
cense ;  it  was  his  business  to  pour  the  oil  in  lamps  round 
the  idols,  to  burn  the  incense,  to  place  the  flowers  before 
the  images,  and  after  purifying  the  coco-nuts  and  plan- 
tains, to  return  them  to  the  people  with  the  statement  that 
they  had  been  accepted  by  the  devil.  Every  Tuesday  and 
Friday,  people  anxious  to  get  children  or  to  avert  sick- 
ness would  bring  offerings  to  the  temple. 

He  tells  me  that  he  believed  in  devils,  but  had  no  faith 
at  all  in  these  offerings  and  ceremonies.  He  was,  if  one 
may  say  so,  a  Blougram  of  Hinduism.  In  his  village, 
as  I  have  said,  they  acknowledged  twenty  devils, 
and  the  old  saint  of  Manady  lived  at  that  time  upon  the 
superstition  of  the  people.  He  was  married  and  had 
four  children;  he  was  one  of  the  leading  men  of  the  vil- 
lage and  of  the  panchayat  —  a  kind  of  village  council ; 
he  possessed  several  buffaloes,  owned  a  coco-nut  grove, 
and  had  many  fields  under  rice.  It  was  a  life  as  full  of 
prosperity  and  authority  as  any  Tamil  could  desire. 

How  he  cannot  explain,  but  gradually  there  grew  in 
his  mind  the  notion  that  his  four  vices  —  drinking,  lying, 
stealing,  and  lust  —  were  wrong.  Nothing  in  his  re- 
ligion suggested  this  notion.  The  devils  whom  he  served 
were  themselves  all  given  over  to  these  four  vices  and 
to  many  others.  He  had  never  heard  of  a  good  God, 
and  was  utterly  unacquainted  with  Christianity.  Never- 
theless, he  came  to  feel  in  his  heart  of  hearts  that  drink- 
ing, lying,  stealing,  and  lust  were  wrong.  He  became 
aware  of  the  difference  between  right  and  wrong;  there 
was  no  regenerative  process  in  his  soul,  only  a  distress 


no  OTHER  SHEEP 

and  vague  unrest  at  the  growing  certainty  of  this  differ- 
ence between  acts  which  w^ere  right  and  acts  which  were 
wrong.     He  did  not  know  in  the  least  what  to  make  of  it. 

I  tried  to  get  from  him  a  clear  statement  of  this  change 
in  his  soul.  I  asked  him  whether  he  had  not  been  told 
as  a  boy  that  vice  w^as  wrong.  He  was  emphatic  in  his 
negative.  I  asked  him  if  he  had  never  heard  of  philo- 
sophic Hinduism,  of  Gautama's  teaching  of  Christianity's 
demand  for  a  clean  heart.  He  assured  me  that  never 
once  in  his  life  had  he  heard  words  of  any  kind  which 
made  a  distinction  between  good  and  evil.  On  the  con- 
trary, devil-worship  had  implanted  in  his  mind  the  idea 
that  excess  and  sin  were  pleasing  to  the  invisible  forces 
of  nature.  Up  to  the  age  of  twenty,  he  told  me,  his 
mind  was  an  utter  blank  as  to  anything  good  or  evil; 
after  twenty,  devil-worship  associated  the  idea  of  evil  in 
his  mind  with  the  mystery  of  existence;  and  then,  be- 
tween the  age  of  forty  and  fifty,  unaccountably,  from 
nowhere  that  his  former  life  could  indicate,  came  this 
idea  of  goodness,  this  strange  and  frightening  idea  that 
there  w^as  wrong  in  what  he  did  because  it  opposed  some- 
thing that  w^as  different,  something  that  was  pure,  some- 
thing that  was  good. 

He  was  in  this  disturbed  state  of  mind,  when  his  far- 
away village,  ten  miles  even  from  Nagercoil,  was  visited 
by  a  party  of  Salvationists.  When  he  first  saw  the  red 
coats  he  was  filled  with  fear,  associating  them  wath  the 
Government!  One  of  the  Salvationists,  a  European, 
came  to  him  and  asked  if  they  might  pass  the  night  in 
his  coco-nut  garden.  Without  thinking  what  he  did,  like 
a  man  in  a  dream,  he  gave  the  Salvationists  the  key  of  the 
place  and  left  them. 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  iii 

At  night  he  came  from  his  house,  and  stood  in  the 
shadows  of  the  trees,  watching  the  Salvationists.  The 
grove  was  flooded  with  moonlight.  They  had  spread 
their  blankets  on  the  ground,  had  eaten  their  meal,  and 
were  now  singing  a  hymn.  The  words  were  in  Tamil, 
but  he  could  not  understand  them.  At  the  end  of  the 
hymn  they  kneeled  down,  and  one  of  them  began  to 
pray.  Drawn  by  curiosity,  the  devil-priest  came  out  of 
the  shadows  and  approached  the  group  in  the  moonlight. 
He  sat  with  them  and  they  talked  to  him.  It  was  con- 
fusion for  his  brain,  this  new  religion  of  which  they  spoke 
so  confidently.  A  good  God  was  something  he  could 
dimly  comprehend ;  but  the  rest,  what  did  it  mean  ?  How 
could  it  be  squared  with  his  experience  of  life?  He  re- 
turned to  his  house,  troubled  and  perplexed. 

But  he  found  pleasure  in  talking  to  these  Salvationists, 
and  for  the  eight  days  they  rested  In  his  garden  he  was 
constantly  in  their  midst,  and  even  attended  some  of  the 
services  that  they  held  in  the  village.  He  used  the 
phrase,  "  I  determined  to  be  bolder,"  when  he  spoke  of 
going  to  their  services.  I  asked  him  what  it  was  that 
made  him  go.  "  I  found  pleasure  in  their  talk,"  he  re- 
plied. 

At  the  end  of  the  eighth  day  he  began  to  experience 
the  glory  and  joy  of  faith  in  a  good  God.  "  I  believed !  " 
he  exclaimed,  raising  his  wondering  eyes  and  lifting  up 
his  hands.  "  A  living  God !  "  he  whispered ;  "  a  liznng 
God !  "  This  faith  came  to  him  very  quietly  and  with- 
out violence  or  shock  of  any  kind.  He  described  his 
feelings  at  that  wonderful  moment  as  a  sensation  of 
lightness.  He  said,  "  My  whole  heart  was  filled  with  re- 
joicing." 


112  OTHER  SHEEP 

But  this  was  only  the  first  movement  in  his  mind. 
He  believed  in  God,  in  a  living  God,  in  a  God  Who  was 
good. 

At  a  public  meeting  held  by  the  Salvationists  in  the 
village,  he  renounced  idolatry  and  accepted  the  religion 
of  Christianity. 

The  people  of  the  village  came  about  him,  angry  and 
expostulating,  saying  that  he  was  subverting  the  true  re- 
ligion and  would  bring  disaster  on  them  and  on  himself. 
He  replied  that  God  was  good,  and  he  would  pray  to 
Him  if  evil  threatened. 

He  placed  himself  in  the  hands  of  an  Indian  Chris- 
tian, by  name  Devasigamony,  now  one  of  the  ablest  Sal- 
vationists in  Southern  India,  and  began  to  explore  the 
inwardness  of  Christianity.  From  faith  in  a  living  God, 
he  moved  to  faith  in  an  incarnate  Christ.  From  faith 
in  an  incarnate  Christ,  he  moved  to  faith  in  His  teaching. 
He  believed  in  what  Christ  taught.  Belief  with  him 
meant  absolute  certainty  of  conviction. 

"  And  then,"  he  says,  "  I  saw  the  horror  of  my  past 
and  the  mercy  of  the  Christ  Who  had  redeemed  me  by 
His  love.  I  believed  what  He  said,  that  to  enter  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven,  a  man  must  be  born  again.  I  knew 
that  my  sins  would  cling  to  me,  in  spite  of  my  faith  in  a 
living  God,  unless  I  was  converted  and  became  as  a  little 
child.  I  saw,  too,  that  it  would  be  of  little  use  for  me 
to  preach  faith  in  a  living  God  to  my  people,  when  what 
they  needed  was  repentance  of  their  sins  and  liberation 
through  the  love  of  Christ.  I  felt  how  true,  how  true, 
was  this  teaching  of  my  Lord." 

So  he  went  publicly  to  a  second  meeting  of  the  Salva- 
tionists   and    there    bowed    himself    down    and    prayed 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  113 

for  the  mystery  of  conversion.  He  rose  up  another 
man. 

In  the  strange  history  of  Christianity,  many  have  ex- 
perienced in  a  moment  of  flooding  light  the  mystery  of 
a  new  birth,  freeing  them  altogether  from  the  thraldom 
of  habitual  sins  and  setting  their  feet  in  a  new  way  of 
exalting  joy;  but  few,  I  think,  ever  so  profoundly  ex- 
perienced this  great  mystery  as  the  old  and  withered 
Saint  of  Manady  who  then  and  there,  from  a  man  of 
many  sins  and  a  grasping  avarice,  became  as  a  little 
child. 

It  was  instantaneous  this  conversion,  this  utter  trans- 
formation of  character;  and  the  Christian  gift  that  he  re- 
ceived from  God  at  this  font  of  new  birth  was  an  abso- 
lute faith  in  prayer.  This  is  what  marks  him  out  from 
all  other  men  I  have  ever  met.  His  life  is  a  continual 
prayer.  He  loves  prayer.  It  is  not  so  much  an  activity 
of  his  soul  as  a  world  in  which  he  moves  and  has  his 
being. 

From,  morning  to  night,  on  the  road  as  he  journeys, 
beneath  the  tree  where  he  rests,  in  the  houses  he  visits, 
and  under  the  stars  as  he  waits  for  sleep,  always  he  is 
praying.  Unable  to  read,  he  can  do  nothing  but  pray. 
And  prayer  fills  him  with  unutterable  happiness.  As 
we  spoke  together,  in  the  pauses  that  came  as  I  ques- 
tioned the  interpreter,  the  old  man  would  close  his  eyes, 
and  the  gentle  lips  would  move  in  communion  with  God. 

From  the  moment  of  his  conversion  he  was  subjected 
to  persecution.  His  masters,  the  proud  Sudras,  at- 
tempted to  reave  his  lands  from  him.  The  barber  and 
the  dhobi  were  forbidden  to  visit  him  —  a  deprivation 
terrible    to    a    Hindu.     His    wife    and    his    children 


114  OTHER  SHEEP 

opposed  him.  At  this  time,  too,  disaster  overtook  him. 
One  after  another  his  buffaloes  died,  and  his  crops  failed. 
The  people  pointed  at  him  as  an  object  of  hatred  to 
their  gods.  Cholera  appeared.  Nine  Salvationists  died, 
and  the  devil-dancers  announced  that  the  cause  of  the 
cholera  was  the  devil's  anger  against  Christianity. 

But  still  the  old  man  held  to  his  new  faith.  "  My  dis- 
asters," he  says,  "  only  drew  me  nearer  to  God.  They 
only  made  me  feel  my  great  need  of  Him."  The  people 
sent  to  a  hill-devil,  said  to  be  more  powerful  than  their 
own  valley-devils,  beseeching  the  hill-priest  as  a  favour 
to  send  his  devil  that  the  Saint  might  be  destroyed.  A 
devil-dancer  came  bearing  an  enchantment.  This  en- 
chantment consisted  in  a  repetition  of  words,  a  curse 
upon  the  Saint  and  all  that  belonged  to  him.  Strange 
to  tell,  the  Saint's  sister  and  her  husband  were  stricken 
down  with  fever ;  but  he  went  to  them,  rubbed  water  on 
their  heads,  prayed  to  God  for  them,  and  they  became 
well.  The  man  who  brought  the  enchantments  died  on 
the  same  day. 

This  strange  event  gave  pause  to  his  enemies.  Some 
even  felt  an  awe  for  him.  He  went  to  a  woman  who 
was  very  ill,  prayed  for  her,  and  she  became  well.  An- 
other woman  with  no  child  came  to  him,  he  prayed,  and 
a  child  was  given  to  her.  A  man  named  Veeran,  who 
is  still  living,  returning  from  his  week's  work  in  the 
fields,  became  suddenly  like  a  raving  madman  and  then  fell 
down  in  a  dead  faint ;  it  was  probably  a  case  of  sunstroke, 
but  the  people  thought  him  dead,  bound  up  his  head  in 
the  usual  way  of  preparing  for  his  funeral,  and  were 
carrying  him  away  when  the  Saint  came  to  them,  placed 
water  on  the  man's  head,  and  began  to  pray ;  the  man  sat 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  115 

up  and  asked  for  Kungi-water.  There  is  another  man 
still  alive,  who  was  in  a  dying  state  from  some  internal 
trouble,  when  the  Saint  came  to  him  and  raised  him  up 
to  new  life  by  prayer. 

These  events  established  his  fame.  But  he  shrank 
from  living  a  life  similar  to  that  of  a  devil-dancer,  and 
so,  making  over  his  house  and  lands  to  his  eldest  son, 
he  turned  holy  man  for  Christ,  and  went  out  with  only 
his  staff  and  a  worn  Tamil  Bible  which  he  cannot  read 
himself,  to  preach  the  liberation  of  Christianity  and  to 
pray  for  the  Children  of  India. 

He  has  made  himself  an  outcast  and  a  beggar  for 
Christ.  Throughout  that  part  of  the  country,  homeless 
and  penniless  he  wanders  from  village  to  village,  begging 
his  food  from  the  people,  telling  those  who  will  hear 
him  about  a  good  God,  and  praying  continually  to  his 
Christ.  Sometimes  he  will  be  persuaded  to  stay  for  a 
few  days  in  the  house  of  a  villager,  sometimes  a  little 
crowd  of  people  will  follow  him  into  the  jungle,  some- 
times he  will  rest  under  a  tree  in  some  distant  hamlet 
for  as  long  as  a  week,  but  chiefly  he  is  seen,  lonely  and 
solitary,  upon  the  road,  his  grey  head  bare  to  the  sun, 
his  emaciated  body,  naked  save  for  the  white  cloth  about 
his  loins,  his  feet  shuffling  slowly  through  the  dust,  the 
long  worn  staff  of  the  pilgrim  dragging  in  his  right  hand, 
the  left  hand  nursing  a  faded  and  blistered  Bible  against 
his  breast,  his  eyes  bent  upon  the  dust,  his  lips  moving  in 
prayer. 

Some  people  come  to  him,  seek  him  out,  and  question 
him.  Others,  following  his  Master's  example,  he  calls 
to  quiet  conversation.  At  one  time  he  called  young  men 
to  follow  him,  but  they  replied,  "  We  have  our  work  to 


ii6  OTHER  SHEEP 

do."  He  says  that  men  listen  to  him  more  readily  than 
women.     He  thinks  it  is  best  that  he  should  be  alone. 

I  asked  him  if  he  had  ever  seen  spirits  or  angels  or 
visions  since  his  conversion.  He  replied  that  he  has  seen 
many  evil  spirits  walking  about  in  the  night.  I  asked 
again  if  he  had  ever  seen  angels.  After  a  pause,  his 
large  wonder-full  eyes  becoming  suddenly  very  solemn, 
he  made  answer :  "  Sometimes  I  see  Christ ;  close  at 
my  side :  walking  with  me  on  my  pilgrimage." 

Alone,  solitary,  and  always  uncertain  of  his  next  meal, 
this  strange  and  beautiful  old  man  has  accomplished  an 
extraordinary  work  for  Christianity.  He  has  not  only 
been  the  means  of  definitely  converting  many  men  from 
heathenism,  but  he  has  shaken  the  faith  of  a  whole  vast 
district  in  devil-worship.  It  is  true  that  people  seldom 
send  for  him  until  soothsayers,  witches,  and  devil- 
dancers  have  failed,  but  they  do  send  for  him  at  last,  and 
the  marvellous  results  attributed  to  his  prayers  have 
turned  the  hearts  of  many  from  the  idea  of  Evil  to  the 
idea  of  Good.  Even  the  Sudras,  the  proudest  and  most 
rigid  caste  in  Southern  India,  send  for  him  on  occasion. 
Not  long  ago,  at  a  place  called  Poothapandy,  a  devil  was 
said  to  have  got  possession  of  three  men,  who  became 
suddenly  frantic  and  dangerous,  behaved  like  the  demon- 
possessed  in  the  New  Testament,  and  were  finally 
brought  to  a  state  of  uncontrollable  madness.  The  Saint 
of  Manady  went  to  them.  On  his  arrival  he  found  that 
one  of  the  men  was  dead.  He  prayed  to  God  in  the 
house  of  the  other  two,  and  then  commanded  the  devil 
to  go  out.  Both  men  perfectly  recovered.  Such  stories 
concerning  him  are  innumerable. 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  117, 

Another  story  concerning  a  devil-priest  will  be  suf- 
ficient to  acquaint  the  reader  with  the  nature  of  this 
demon-worship  and  the  extreme  difficulty  encountered 
by  Christianity  in  the  deep-rooted  traditionalism  of  the 
Indian  peoples. 

Masillamony  of  Vadasery  is  a  tall  and  heavy  old  man, 
wiHi  a  face  that  tells  of  long  and  arduous  conflict  of 
the  soul.  There  is  in  the  small  and  puckered  eyes  a  look 
of  weariness  and  unlifting  sorrow;  the  tall  forehead  is 
bagged  and  overhanging  with  wrinkles :  the  mouth,  just 
visible  between  white  moustache  and  short  beard,  is 
depressed  with  something  that  is  almost  bitterness.  He 
is  laborious  and  slow,  but  there  is  in  his  face  a  look  of 
masculine  dignity;  one  feels  in  his  presence  the  sense  of 
power  and  authority. 

At  the  age  of  nineteen  he  abandoned  heathenism  and 
surrendered  to  a  Christian  Mission  which  had  lately  sent 
emissaries  to  his  village.  In  this  village  he  was  a  man 
of  considerable  influence,  and  by  his  persuasions  the  en- 
tire community  of  a  hundred  families  renounced  idolatry 
and  became  Christians.  The  idols  were  destroyed;  the 
temple  was  laid  level  with  the  dust. 

Masillamony  at  the  age  of  fourteen  had  married  a 
wife  of  nine.  On  the  death  of  this  wife  he  had  married 
again.  And  now,  soon  after  his  conversion,  the  second 
wife  dying,  he  proceeded  to  make  arrangements  for  a 
third  marriage.  Now,  he  was  headman  of  the  village 
at  this  time,  a  man  of  unusual  intelligence,  and  one  of 
those  personalities  which  are  like  a  magic  on  the  wills 
of  other  men.  Such  a  person  was  worth  marrying,  and 
perhaps  the  fortunes  of  the  village  depended  in  no  small 


Ii8  OTHER  SHEEP 

measure  on  the  character  of  his  next  wife.  In  any  case, 
the  pastor  in  charge  of  'the  Mission,  a  Native  Christian, 
made  up  his  mind  that  Masillamony  should  marry  one 
of  his  relations.  Masillamony,  on  the  other  hand,  made 
up  his  mind  that  he  would  marry  in  quite  another  quar- 
ter. There  was  a  dispute,  a  rupture,  a  feud,  and  at  last 
open  war.  The  pastor  refused  to  perform  the  ceremony 
of  this  new  marriage.  Masillamony,  with  the  help  of  his 
friends,  performed  the  ceremony  for  himself,  according 
to  the  Christian  rites  so  far  as  he  understood  them. 

There  followed  a  tremendous  upheaval  in  that  little 
village.  The  Native  pastor  issued  an  edict  fining  every 
person  who  had  attended  this  marriage,  which  he  de- 
clared to  be  invalid.  Masillamony  in  a  towering  passion 
hurled  defiance  at  the  pastor,  and  calling  the  people  about 
him  proposed  that  they  should  return  to  the  worship  of 
their  fathers.  Nearly  the  whole  village  followed  his 
leadership. 

On  his  threshing  floor,  which  had  been  cleansed  from 
idolatry,  he  set  up  the  old  swamis  and  rebuilt  a  temple 
to  the  sandal-wood  goddess.  He,  the  headman  of  the 
village,  became  priest  and  devil-dancer  of  this  temple. 
He  drank  deeply  of  arrack  to  work  himself  up  into  ter- 
rible frenzies.  "  Of  course,  I  had  to  do  it,"  he  says, 
"  or  the  people  would  have  had  no  faith  in  me."  He  de- 
clares that  he  himself  had  no  belief  either  in  the  god- 
dess or  the  ceremonies.  He  was  a  priest  for  the  sake 
of  power  and  out  of  a  spirit  of  revenge.  But  he  con- 
fesses that  the  wild  music  and  the  frenzied  dances  be- 
stowed upon  him  some  unaccountable  immunity  from 
pain.  Great  pots  of  boiling  water,  into  which  turmeric 
and  other  things  had  been  placed,  were  thrown  over  him 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  119 

as  he  danced,  and  he  says  that  they  seemed  to  him  only 
like  cold  water. 

He  had  never  been  grossly  immoral  himself,  but  the 
village  was  corrupt,  and  moral  perversions  of  an  odious 
character  were  common.  He  says  that  he  never  looked 
upon  these  things  as  sinful,  but  regarded  them  as  shame- 
ful, and  sought,  by  his  power  as  headman,  to  put  a  stop  to 
them.  He  tells  me  that  he  felt  even  as  a  youth  that  im- 
morality was  something  unworthy  of  human  nature. 

I  pressed  him  on  the  point  of  his  faith  in  the  goddess. 
"  I  do  not  know,"  he  replied,  "  w^hether  I  really  believed 
in  her  or  not.  I  felt  that  there  was  something  true  in 
the  idea,  and  I  knew  that  as  priest  I  had  opportunities 
for  power  over  the  people.  It  was  for  power  that  I  per- 
formed the  ceremonies  of  the  temple.  I  wanted  to  be 
master."  "  But,"  I  asked  again,  *'  did  you  ever  think  to 
yourself, —  There  is  no  such  person  as  this  sandal-wood 
goddess;  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  devil-goddess 
at  all?" 

*'  I  knew  that  there  were  evil  spirits,"  he  said. 

"  How  did  you  know  ?  " 

"  There  are  evil  spirits,"  he  replied,  "  everybody  knows 
that  there  are  evil  spirits." 

"  Have  you  ever  seen  any  ?  " 

"  No." 

"  But  you  believe  in  them  ?  " 

**  They  have  no  power  to  do  anything ;  but  there  are 
many  evil  spirits ;  I  know  it." 

"Have  you  ever  seen  visions  of  any  kind?" 

"  Yes.  I  have  had  a  vision.  Once.  It  was  not  long 
ago.  Three  angels  came  to  me.  Two  did  not  open  their 
mouths,  but  one  said  to  me,  '  Thirty -one  people  will  die 


120  OTHER  SHEEP 

in  this  village/  I  asked,  '  Why  should  God  so  suddenly 
destroy  the  lives  of  ail  these  people  ?  '  The  same  angel 
said,  '  The  order  has  passed.'  The  other  two  did  not 
speak.  Then  they  disappeared.  In  three  days'  time 
cholera  came  suddenly,  and  thirty-one  people  perished. 
No  more  than  thirty-one.  Exactly  thirty-one.  That  is 
the  only  vision  I  have  ever  had." 

He  told  me  that  although  he  had  never  properly  real- 
ized Christianity,  he  was  haunted  by  the  idea  of  Christ  all 
through  the  long  years  of  his  devil-priesthood.  He  was 
wretched  and  unhappy.  But  pride  kept  him  on  his 
course.  "  I  was  too  proud  to  yield,"  he  said.  "  The 
Mission  sent  a  new  pastor;  they  tried  to  get  me  back; 
but  I  laughed  at  them." 

One  day  a  European  Salvationist  came  to  the  village. 
He  had  heard  of  Masillamony,  and  going  up  to  him,  he 
took  his  hand,  led  him  into  the  shade  of  a  tree,  and  said, 
"  You  must  become  a  Christian."  They  remained  sit- 
ting and  talking  under  the  tree  for  more  than  an  hour. 
At  the  end  of  this  conference  Masillamony  said,  "  If 
ever  I  become  a  Christian  again,  it  will  be  as  a  Salvation- 
ist." 

He  told  me  that  he  felt  his  heart  softened  by  this  col- 
loquy under  the  tree,  and  that  ever  afterwards  he  was 
haunted  by  it,  knowing  himself  to  lack  something,  to  be 
incomplete,  to  be  untrue.  Altogether  he  remained  a 
devil-priest  for  thirty-eight  years  after  the  rupture  with 
the  Mission,  and  all  those  years  were  dogged  for  him 
by  wretchedness  and  the  haunting  of  a  great  lack  in  his 
life. 

Towards  the  end  of  this  long  misery  there  came  to 
him  a  Native  Salvationist,  one  Sena  Putra,   a  saintly 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  121" 

man  as  simple  as  a  child,  wistful  in  his  methods,  and 
tranquil  in  his  faith.  The  two  would  sit  together  in  the 
gloom  of  Masillamony's  mud  house  with  the  fine  porch 
of  carved  wood  and  the  granary  above  the  living  room. 
Masillamony  used  to  laugh  at  him.  "  Why,"  he  would 
say,  banter ingly,  "  I  know  the  Bible  better  than  you  do !  " 
And  Sena  Putra,  being  too  gentle  and  too  humble  to  con- 
tradict or  even  doubt  the  boast,  would  reply,  "  Then 
that  is  another  reason  why  you  should  surrender  to 
God." 

On  the  one  side  of  this  controversy  was  a  master- 
ful old  man,  serving  idols,  given  to  devil-dancing,  and 
tenacious  of  his  authority  in  the  village;  on  the  other, 
as  meek  a  disciple  of  Christ  as  ever  found  joy  in  sur- 
render to  the  will  of  God.  The  one  man  was  unhappy, 
uncertain,  unrestful;  the  other,  happy,  certain,  restful. 
The  one  man  had  intelligence  and  power;  the  other, 
nothing  but  the  sweetness  of  a  spirit  dwelling  continually 
in  the  blissful  region  of  faith. 

It  was  the  saint  who  conquered  in  this  contest.  He 
said  nothing  to  persuade  the  old  priest,  triumphed  over 
him  never  once  in  argument,  and  w^as  many  times  dumb 
before  the  Scriptural  onslaught  of  his  powerful  antag- 
onist. But  he  possessed  the  secret.  In  his  face  there 
was  neither  storm  nor  vexation,  in  his  voice  there  was 
neither  trouble  nor  perplexity.  He  spoke  of  Sin  as 
something  that  separated  the  heart  of  man  from  God, 
and  of  Christ  as  the  Saviour  Who  sets  free  the  heart  of 
man  from  all  the  fetters  and  barriers  of  Sin.  He  spoke 
of  Liberation  —  of  the  freedom  of  a  heart  cleansed  from 
evil  and  so  set  upon  goodness  that  it  becomes  the  dwell- 
ing-place of  God.     He  said  that  religion  gave  peace  to 


122  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  brain  and  joy  to  the  heart.  He  said  — "  To  be  born 
again  is  to  be  at  rest." 

The  other  man,  dwelling  in  the  shadows  of  his  dark 
house,  or  going  down  to  his  rice-fields,  or  entering  the 
temple  of  his  goddess,  was  ^haunted  by  the  knowledge 
that  he  lacked  peace.  He  said  to  himself  — "  This 
goddess  gives  me  nothing."  He  said  to  himself  — "  I 
was  a  Christian  once,  but  I  did  not  understand."  He 
would  sit  by  himself  wondering  if  he  could  yet  be  born 
again.  "  If  I  would  be  a  Christian,"  he  thought,  "  it  is 
certainly  necessary  to  be  born  again." 

Then,  so  insistent  at  his  heart  was  the  longing  for 
liberation,  he  said  — "  I  will  seek  God  " ;  and  he  felt  him- 
self even  with  the  resolution  at  the  door  of  a  new  life. 
No  more  idol-worship,  no  more  service  of  the  devil,  no 
more  darkness,  uncertainty,  and  fear.  He  came  out 
from  his  dark  house,  passed  down  the  curving  street  of 
mud-houses,  and  presented  himself  before  Sena  Putra. 
"  Take  me,"  he  said ;  ''  I  know  now  what  I  want  to  be  — 
I  know,  too,  what  these  people  must  become." 

Such  was  the  power  of  his  personality  that  the  whole 
village  came  over  with  him  to  Christianity. 

Some  months  after  a  little  ceremony  was  made  of 
handing  over  to  Fakir  Singh  as  head  of  the  Salvationists 
in  India  the  temple  in  which  Masillamony  had  served 
as  priest. 

I  was  present  at  the  strange  scene.  From  the  crowded 
town  of  Nagercoil,  where  the  Hindus  can  still  prevent 
any  European  from  walking  down  their  streets  at  a  time 
of  festival,  came  a  procession  of  Salvationists,  winding 
with  the  dusty  and  uneven  road  to  the  little  village  of 
East  Vadasery.     Their  band  was  playing  and  their  ban- 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  123 

ner  caught  the  flames  of  the  setting  sun.  On  the  faces 
of  the  men  there  was  a  look  of  triumph  and  amusement; 
the  young  women  —  so  wonderfully,  so  amazingly  dif- 
ferent from  the  poor  wretched  women  still  living  in  the 
degradation  of  Hinduism  —  marched  with  a  self-con- 
scious joy.  Every  now  and  then  this  bright  and  happy 
procession,  with  which  were  marching  several  European 
Salvationists,  would  lift  their  voices  and  sing  to  the 
band  in  melodious  Tamil  a  hymn  to  the  Christian  God. 
People  who  came  to  their  doors,  or  who  stood  at  street 
corners  to  watch  them  pass,  gazed  with  something  very 
like  pride  at  the  smart  and  splendid  young  men  of  the 
band  and  the  handsome  vigorous  girls  marching  with 
their  tambourines  and  smiling  as  they  went.  It  was 
as  if  the  India  of  to-day  was  watching  the  India  of 
to-morrow. 

East  Vadasery  lies  off  the  main  road,  some  little  way 
beyond  the  large  hospital  of  the  Salvation  Army.  You 
leave  the  broad,  tree-sheltered  road,  and  crossing  an  old 
bridge,  follow  a  narrow  lane  which  curves  like  a  ser- 
pent between  hedges  of  cactus  and  fields  of  rice  till  it 
ends  abruptly  in  a  street  of  mud-houses  —  low,  palm- 
roofed  buildings  red-brown  in  colour  and  flush  with  the 
lane.  At  the  end  of  the  street,  where  it  widens  and 
ends  in  a  wall  with  a  stile  descending  to  the  rice-fields, 
and  under  the  beautiful  shadows  of  a  huge  tree,  stands 
the  little  temple  —  a  pitiful  enough  structure,  but  with 
something  pleasing  and  picturesque  in  its  low-reaching 
roof  and  its  quasi-tower  over  the  altar  of  the  goddess. 

As  the  procession,  filling  the  whole  street,  which  was 
decorated  with  paper  flags  of  many  colours,  advanced 
to  the  open  space  before  the  temple,  I  saw  old  people 


124  OTHER  SHEEP 

peering  out  at  it  from  the  dark  interiors  of  the  little 
houses,  like  animals  afraid.  At  the  temple  the  Salva- 
tionists sang  a  hymn  in  Tamil,  which  went  to  a  tune  of 
triumph  and  contained  the  lines :  "  We  have  been  wor- 
shippers of  false  gods;  Let  us  now  take  up  the  Cross; 
Soldiers  of  Jesus ! "  Old  Masillamony  stood  in  front 
of  Fakir  Singh,  careworn  and  anxious  it  seemed  to  me, 
watching  the  face  of  this  great  Guru,  and  holding  in 
his  hands  the  handsome  iron  key  of  the  temple. 

Beyond  this  congregation  stretched  a  wide  landscape 
of  green  rice-fields,  in  the  distance  a  wooden-railed 
bridge  over  the  canal,  and  farther  away  still  purple 
mountains  misty  and  soft  in  the  glory  of  the  setting  sun. 
Men  and  women  were  at  work  in  the  fields.  Above 
them,  in  the  quiet  beauty  of  the  skies,  wheeled  a  great 
kite  —  one  of  those  birds  in  whom  the  Hindus  see  an 
incarnation  of  Krishna. 

Masillamony's  son  read  an  address,  in  which  Fakir 
Singh  was  invited  to  take  possession  of  the  temple  and 
make  it  a  place  of  Christian  worship.  Then  the  old 
man  stretched  out  his  hand,  the  Fakir  took  the  key,  and 
people  pressed  forward  to  enter  the  abode  of  the  god- 
dess. 

It  was  dark  inside,  so  dark  that  people  struck 
matches.  There  was  no  furniture  of  any  kind.  The 
walls  were  not  decorated.  In  the  outer  court  was  some- 
thing that  served  as  an  idol.  Beyond,  where  the  steps 
led  to  the  altar,  three  or  four  clumsy  shapes  of  mud 
represented  all  the  forces  of  devil-worship  —  making 
their  last  stand  against  the  reason  of  man  and  the  con- 
science of  righteousness. 

The  little  lights  twinkled  in  the  darkness  and  gloom 


DEVIL-PRIESTS  125 

of  the  temple.  Voices  sounded  everywhere.  Crow- 
bars began  to  break  up  altar  and  idols  with  a  dull  thud- 
ding noise.  The  foul  air  became  suffocating  with  their 
dust. 

I  made  my  escape  from  the  scene,  and  went  to  visit 
the  house  of  Masillamony  —  the  house  from  which  he 
has  ruled  the  village  through  a  long  lifetime,  and  the 
house  in  which  he  sat  for  so  many  months  in  conflict 
with  Sena  Putra.  I  wanted  to  see  that  interior  more 
than  the  idols  he  had  served  without  faith. 

Over  the  door  was  a  handsome  porch  with  carved 
pillars,  the  wood  blistered,  cracked,  and  unpainted. 
The  door  itself  was  heavy  and  strong,  with  a  handsome 
handle.  Inside  one  found  a  large  and  gloomy  room, 
to  which  light  entered  from  a  door  at  the  back,  on  the 
step  of  which  some  shabby  fowls  were  waiting  for  food. 
A  rough  ladder-like  flight  of  stairs  led  from  the  floor 
of  trodden  clay  to  a  loft  above.  There  was  no  chair 
in  the  room,  no  table,  and  no  bed.  In  one  of  the  cor- 
ners lay  a  reed  mat  where  the  old  man  slept;  near  the 
stairs  stood  three  or  four  barrels  containing  grain;  at 
the  back  of  the  room  several  brass  vessels,  brightly  pol- 
ished, were  ranged  upon  the  floor. 

It  was  like  a  barn  save  for  its  extreme  cleanness  and 
some  subtle  sense  of  humanity  which  haunted  the  dark 
air.  One  could  not  think  of  it  as  a  man's  house. 
There  was  in  it  nothing  either  of  comfort  or  disorder. 
As  the  byre  or  stable  or  sty  of  some  ascetic  dwelling  in 
unbroken  solitude  with  the  thoughts  of  his  own  soul, 
one  could  understand  the  strange  and  throttled  human- 
ity of  this  sombre  place.  But  one  could  not  feel  that 
a  woman  had  ever  lived  there,  that  love  had  been  glad 


126  OTHER  SHEEP 

there,  that  children  had  ever  played  on  its  earthen  floor 
or  made  the  mud  walls  re-echo  with  their  play. 

I  climbed  the  ladder-like  stairs  to  the  apartment 
above.  It  was  a  swept  and  garnished  loft  crowded  with 
barrels  of  grain.  It  was  there,  in  the  dim  light  and 
under  the  hot  roof,  that  one  realized  the  wealth  of  the 
proprietor.  These  innumerable  tubs  and  barrels  filled 
to  the  top  with  the  fruits  of  the  earth,  represented  a 
European's  bank,  a  miser's  gold  and  a  collector's 
treasures.  They  were  wealth  and  security.  Let  the  sun 
scorch  the  earth,  let  the  rains  destroy  the  crops,  let 
Governments  fall,  let  the  bourses  of  the  civilized 
nations  send  ruin  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  let  calamity 
succeed  calamity  —  and  still,  here  there  would  be  wealth 
and  security. 

When  I  came  out  from  the  dwelling  all  the  idols  were 
demolished,  and  a  look  of  relief  had  appeared  in  the 
puckered  eyes  of  Masillamony.  He  was  surrounded  by 
talkative  villagers,  and  with  one  hand  at  the  bunch  of 
white  hair  on  his  chest,  the  fingers  of  the  other  fidget- 
ing with  the  considerable  waist  of  his  loin  cloth,  the 
fat  and  bearded  old  man  was  listening  with  troubled 
patience  to  these  chatterers,  as  I  have  seen  the  late 
Lord  Salisbury  lending  an  unwilling  ear  to  the  inquisi- 
tive and  too  pushful  lesser  members  of  his  party.  But 
the  look  of  anxiety  was  gone.  There  was  satisfaction 
in  the  small  mouth  and  the  light  of  laughter  in  the  eyes. 


RESPECTABLE  HINDUISM 

Among  the  men  I  met  in  Southern  India  was  a  little 
droll  creature  in  gold-rimmed  spectacles,  whose  pro- 
truding and  widespread  teeth  under  a  ragged  mous- 
tache shone  with  the  same  light  of  cheerful  good  spirits 
as  glittered  in  his  happy  eyes.  The  v/hole  face  was 
a-shine  with  amusement.  One  could  not  sit  in  his  com- 
pany without  smiling.  Everything  in  the  universe 
seemed  to  move  his  mirth.  And  he  was  eager  in  his 
talk,  quick  in  his  movements,  and  delighted  with  all 
he  said  —  like  a  child  at  a  party.  I  never  knew  the  real 
meaning  of  the  word  chuckle  till  I  got  into  conversation 
with  this  little  parcel  of  human  cheerfulness. 

He  came  of  a  high-caste  family,  and  was  well  ac- 
quainted with  Hinduism.  It  occurred  to  me  that  a  born 
humorist  might  be  able  to  furnish  a  more  intelligible 
account  of  this  perplexing  religion  than  some  of  the 
philosophers  whose  tedious  works  on  the  subject  had 
often  exasperated  me  by  their  contradictions  and  confu- 
sions. So  I  asked  him  if  he  would  tell  me  all  about  Hin- 
duism, respectable,  orthodox,  high-caste,  and  non-devil- 
dancing  Hinduism,  just  as  he  would  tell  an  Indian  all 
about  Christianity  —  easily,  conversationally,  and  hold- 
ing only  to  the  main  points. 

At  this  he  burst  out  laughing,  hugged  his  knees  as 

127 


128  OTHER  SHEEP 

he  sat  on  the  floor,  and  pressing  his  protruding  teeth 
upon  his  brown  under-lip  regarded  me  with  a  satisfied 
dehght. 

''  It  will  make  you  laugh !  "  he  exclaimed. 

''To  begin  with  —  ?" 

"  Oh,  the  beginning  is  funny.  It  is  ridiculous.  The 
beginning  is  Brahma.  Brahma  is  the  god  of  gods,  but  — 
he  is  never  worshipped!  There  is  not  a  single  temple 
erected  to  Brahma,  and  not  a  single  Hindu  ever  prays  to 
him.  Do  you  know  why?  Well,  it's  a  funny  story. 
Hinduism  begins  with  three  gods  —  Brahma,  Siva,  and 
Vishnu.  Those  are  the  three  from  whom  the  other  three 
hundred  million  gods  have  all  descended.  One  day  Brah- 
ma and  Vishnu  had  an  argument.  They  couldn't  decide, 
these  two  gods,  which  was  the  taller.  Of  course  they  got 
warm  on  the  subject.  Brahma  said  he  could  give  young 
Vishnu  a  head;  Vishnu  retorted  that  he  could  beat  old 
Brahma  by  a  couple  of  heads  and  fling  in  three  necks 
and  four  pairs  of  shoulders  —  so  there!  Something 
like  that.  In  any  case  the  dispute  got  so  hot  that  they 
determined  to  make  an  end  of  it.  They  agreed  that  one 
should  go  up  into  the  mountain  of  creation,  and  the 
other  down,  and  he  would  be  the  taller  god  who  first 
came  to  the  end  of  things.  Brahma  elected  to  go  up, 
and  turned  himself  into  a  bird.  Vishnu  said  he  would 
go  down,  and  converted  himself  into  a  pig.  Very  well. 
One  —  two  —  three,  OFF!  Away  they  went.  Vishnu 
began  to  pant  and  to  blow.  *Pouf!'  he  says;  'I 
can't  stand  this  any  longer;  a  little  of  this  goes  a  long 
way,'  he  says,  and  back  he  comes.  Brahma  flew  up 
and  up,  but  he  got  tired.  He  wished  creation  wasn't 
quite  so  big  or  his  wings  weren't  quite  so  heavy.     *  My 


RESPECTABLE  HINDUISM  129 

eye ! '  he  says,  '  but  the  world's  bigger  than  I  thought 
it  was/  For  forty  years  the  brave  old  fellow  kept  it 
up,  but  he  got  sicker  and  sicker,  his  eyes  could  scarcely 
keep  open,  and  his  wings  began  to  moult  —  flying  ma- 
chines weren't  invented  in  those  days.  Just  when  he 
was  nearly  done,  he  saw  a  flower  falling  towards  him, 
and  asked  it  where  it  came  from.  *  Don't  talk  to  me,' 
said  the  flower ;  '  I  come  from  the  top  of  Siva's  head ; 
I've  been  falling  for  years;  and  I'm  dreadfully  tired.' 
That's  what  the  flower  said.  Brahma  glanced  up,  and 
thought  to  himself,  '  This  isn't  good  enough,'  and  he 
said  to  the  flower,  '  Look  here,  will  you  tell  Vishnu 
that  I  have  seen  the  top  of  the  hills?  '  *  Anything  you 
like,'  said  the  flower.  And  down  they  both  went  to- 
gether. When  he  saw  them,  Vishnu  asked,  *  Have  you 
been  to  the  very  top?'  'Yes,'  said  Brahma.  'Has 
he  ? '  asked  Vishnu.  '  He  has,'  said  the  flower. 
'Then  I've  lost,'  said  Vishnu;  'but,  at  the  same  time 

—  hullo !  what's  that  ?  '  They  all  sprang  up  in  alarm. 
Fire  leaped  out  of  the  earth;  Siva  descended  in  a  rage 

—  and  oh,  how  he  cursed  that  flower,  and  oh,  how  he 
rated  Brahma,  and  oh,  how  Vishnu  chuckled  with  de- 
light! That's  the  story  of  the  Hindu  trinity.  The 
Brahma  of  Brahmanism,  because  he  told  a  lie,  is  never 
worshipped  and  is  not  permitted  to  have  a  single  tem- 
ple ;  the  North  of  India  worships  Vishnu,  and  the  South 
of  India  worships  Siva  —  and  as  for  the  flower  — 
the  wild  apple  flower  —  it  is  never  used  in  temple  wor- 
ship. You  will  see  it  in  a  girl's  hair,  but  never  on  a 
Hindu  altar.     It  told  a  lie !  " 

"  Is  there  jealousy,"  I  asked,  "  between  the  followers 
of  Vishnu  and  the  followers  of  Siva  ?  " 


I30  OTHER  SHEEP 

*'  The  most  religious  of  them,"  he  replied,  with  a 
chuckle,  "  quarrel  like  cat  and  dog." 

"  But  the  others " 

"  No,  they  don't  quarrel :  at  least,  they  aren't  at  it 
morning  and  night.  But  each  thinks  the  other  is  wrong. 
They  have  different  temples,  and  different  ceremonies. 
They  do  not  mix  together." 

"Which  is  the  better?" 

"  Neither !     Both  are  bad." , 

"  In  what  way  ?  " 

"  Oh,  bad." 

"  Are  they  both  sensual  in  their  form  of  worship?  " 

He  nodded  his  head. 

"The  priests?" 

"  Ninety-five  out  of  every  hundred,"  he  said,  "  are 
immoral.     Five  in  every  hundred  are  good  men." 

"  Tell  me  about  the  ceremonies." 

"  There's  no  preaching  to  begin  with,"  he  replied. 
"  I  was  a  Sivite  for  twenty-eight  years  and  I  never  once 
heard  a  sermon  and  never  once  heard  a  priest  teach 
morality.  Never  once  in  twenty-eight  years!  The 
people  pray  their  own  prayers,  and  the  priest  burns  lights 
and  camphor  before  the  idols.  Incense  is  never  used 
for  high-caste  gods  —  only  for  demons.  The  temple 
girls  —  you  know  what  they  are,  I  suppose !  —  posture, 
and  dance,  and  sing.  The  people  pray,  and  these  girls 
in  fine  dresses  and  covered  with  jewels,  sing  their  songs, 
writhe  with  their  bodies,  and  wave  their  arms  in  the  air." 

"  Are  the  words  of  their  songs  indecent  ?  " 

"  No ;  oh,  no !  They  are  called  The  Garlands  of  God, 
and  are  songs  of  praise.  They  contain  such  sentiments 
as  — '  I  will  worship  thee :  the  only  god !     I  will  praise 


RESPECTABLE  HINDUISM  131 

thee,  and  give  thanks  to  thee.  Thou  hast  created  me, 
fed  me,  and  wilt  take  care  of  me/  It's  different  from 
the  singing  of  the  devil-dancers :  but  —  well,  the  girls 
are  there  only  for  one  purpose.  The  priests  don't  keep 
them  to  praise  god  when  they're  old!  There  are  some 
ugly  scenes  in  these  temples.  Every  day,  morning  and 
evening,  and  sometimes  midday,  the  priest  performs  his 
ceremony  at  the  altar.  The  girls  remain  in  the  outer 
court.  No  one  else  is  present.  Then  he  comes  down 
from  the  altar  and  enters  the  outer  court  carrying  the 
gods'  rice  to  the  girls.  They  crowd  round  him,  laugh- 
ing, and  pushing,  and  jesting.  Well,  you  can  imagine 
the  rest.  Horrible  places!  They  never  have  any  win- 
dows. They  are  practically  air-tight.  Where  the  god 
dwells  it  is  pitch  dark  and  suffocating.  Oh,  you 
wouldn't  like  one  of  those  temples !  " 

I  asked  him  about  the  nature  of  the  prayers  prayed 
by  the  genuine  worshippers. 

''  Hindu  people  of  the  better  class,"  he  said,  "  are 
not  immoral  in  their  prayers,  but  they  only  kneel  for 
material  blessings.  They  go  to  get  something  out  of 
their  god.  It  is  wonderful  how  many  of  them  believe 
in  idolatry.  They  polish  their  gods,  feed  them,  cover 
them  up,  fan  the  flies  away,  and  would  rather  injure 
themselves  than  one  of  their  idols.  They  fear  what 
Siva  may  do  to  them.  They  don't  want  to  be  better 
people.  Prayer  means,  '  Don't  hurt  me,'  or  *  Please 
give  me  something  nice.'     They're  funny  people !  " 

''  Now,  in  a  few  words,  what  do  these  people  be- 
lieve?" 

"  Hinduism  is  just  this  —  belief  in  reincarnation  and 
aspiration  after  non-existence.     Everybody  believes  that 


.132  OTHER  SHEEP 

a  person  must  be  born  seven  times,  as  grass,  plants, 
trees,  insects,  birds,  animals,  men;  afterwards,  that  a 
person  will  go  on  being  born  until  he  is  fit  to  inhabit  the 
body  of  a  Brahman.  Then — ^well,  of  course,  there's 
nothing  else  —  heaven !  And  heaven  is  a  ceasing  of 
the  individual  life  in  the  universal  consciousness  of  the 
god." 

"  But  there  are  bad  Brahmans?  " 

"A  bad  Brahman  has  to  be  born  again.     According 
to  the  nature  of  his  sin,  so  he  must  descend  and  begin  the 
climb  once  more  till  he  is  fit  to  be  a  Brahman.'^ 
"  That  is  the  faith  of  Hinduism?  " 

"  If  I  was  to  tell  you  about  the  philosophy '' 

"  No,  we  will  leave  that." 

"What  I  have  told  you  is  what  the  people  believe. 
It  is  the  religion  of  India.'' 

"  Now,  tell  me  what  are  the  commands  of  this  re- 
ligion.    What  does  it  tell  a  man  he  must  not  do?  " 

"  It  tells  a  man,"  he  replied,   with  another  chuckle, 
"  that  it  is  shameful  — 

To  walk  with  his  wife  in  the  street. 
To  eat  with  his  wife  in  the  house. 
To  shave  himself. 

To  eat  in  the  presence  of  a  European. 
To  touch  a  person  of  lower  caste. 
To  let  a  low-caste  person  enter  his  house. 
To  permit  his  wife  to  sit  while  he  is  standing. 
These  things  are  universally  condemned." 
"  And  what  does  it  command  a  man  to  do  ?  " 
"  In  morality,  nothing.     No ;  it  only  tells  a  man  how 
he  must  wash,  what  he  must  say  when  he  is  doing  this 
and  that,  and  —  well,  other  ceremonial  things.     There 


RESPECTABLE  HINDUISM  133 

is  no  moral  teaching  at  all.  Not  a  bit.  Not  a  scrap. 
It  is  generally  believed  that  the  holiest  man  is  one  who 
lives  an  existence  of  privation  and  commits  no  sin;  in 
some  of  the  sacred  books  there  are  moral  ideas;  five  in 
every  hundred  of  the  priests  are  virtuous  men ;  but  Hin- 
duism, the  religion  of  the  Indian  peoples,  does  not  lift 
a  little  finger  either  to  save  the  sinner  or  to  make  men 
better.  That  isn't  its  business.  I  assure  you,  Hindu- 
ism is  something  which  never  yet  helped  a  man,  a 
woman,  or  a  child.  It  has  plunged  millions  into  dread- 
ful sins,  and  millions  more  it  has  driven  mad.  But 
helped  us  —  no !     Oh,  dear,  no !  " 

He  explained  to  me  that  the  Sivites  paint  three  hori- 
zontal bars  of  white  upon  the  forehead,  and  the  Vishnu- 
ites  two  upright  bars  of  white  with  a  red  one  dividing 
them.  The  two  white  bars  stand  for  Vishnu's  feet  and 
the  red  represents  his  wife.  The  Hindu  placing  these 
bars  on  his  forehead  says,  "  I  bear  thee  and  thy  wife  on 
my  brows.''  Concerning  the  red  spot  worn  between  the 
eyes  he  told  the  following  legend  with  great  gusto :  — 

"  Siva  and  his  wife  Parvati  were  one  day  playing  a 
game  of  marbles.     In  the  middle  of  the  game  she  asked, 

*  Who  are  the  sun  and  moon  ?  '  He  replied,  *  They  are 
my  eyes.'  '  What ! '  she  cried ;  '  do  you  mean  to  tell  me 
that  if  I  close  both  your  eyes  the  whole  universe  v/ill  be 
dark  ?  '     '  I   do,   indeed,'  he  answered.     '  May  I   try  ?  ' 

*  Certainly.'  She  lifted  her  hands  and  placed  them  over 
her  husband's  eyes.  Instantly  the  whole  universe  became 
dark.  In  this  appalling  darkness  all  the  people  of  the 
earth  stood  still  and  cried  to  Siva  for  help.  The  cry 
touched  his  heart.  Between  the  two  hands  of  Mrs.  Siva 
there  appeared  a  light,  burning  and  glowing  in  the  centre 


134  OTHER  SHEEP 

of  Siva's  forehead.     The  little  red  spot  worn  by  Hindus 
all  over  India  commemorates  that  merciful  event." 
"  But,"  I  asked,  "  what  became  of  the  marbles?  " 
He  laughed  and  hugged  his  knees.     "  They  dropped 
out  of  the  story,"  he  replied. 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS 

At  a-  sweeping  curve  of  the  river  Ganges,  rising  from 
an  earthen  cliff  high  above  the  swerving  water,  stands 
the  sacred  city  of  Benares  —  its  palaces  and  temples, 
its  pinnacles  and  cupolas,  its  minarets  and  spires  crowd- 
ing with  flashing  gilt,  garish  paint,  and  fluttering  flags 
into  the  perfect  blue  of  a  pure  heaven. 

The  bank,  on  which  this  wonderful  city  stands  with 
so  superb  a  beauty,  gives  its  complexion  to  the  river  and 
its  spirit  to  the  place.  It  is  in  colour  like  the  bottom  of 
a  pond  dried  and  cracked  by  the  sun,  a  pallid  brown 
that  is  almost  grey.  Without  the  solid  richness  of  mud 
or  the  innumerable  vivacity  of  sand,  it  has  a  worn, 
shabby,  and  melancholy  look  —  as  torpid  as  putty,  as  life- 
less as  stucco.  One  is  not  conscious  in  this  crumbling  cliff 
either  of  the  vigour  of  endurance  or  of  the  energy  for 
catastrophe :  it  will  not  stand  stubborn  and  unshaken  for 
a  thousand  years,  nor  will  it  suddenly  be  blown  away  in 
a  cloud  of  glittering  dust.  It  impresses  one  with  the 
sense  of  a  subsidence  which  is  perpetual  but  laborious 
—  a  mouldering  down,  and  a  crumbling  away,  so  grad- 
ual that  the  cliff  will  never  perish,  and  yet  so  continual 
that  it  will  he  for  ever  falling. 

Benares  is  of  the  very  stuff  of  this  earthen  cliff  on 
which  it  stands  aspiring  to  the  blue  of  the  sky  and  sub- 
siding to  the  mud  of  the  river.  In  spite  of  painted 
buildings,  brazen  domes,  coloured  towers,  and  glitter- 

135 


136  OTHER  SHEEP 

ing  balconies;  in  spite  of  the  green  foliage  of  pipal, 
neem,  and  tamarind  trees  which  lift  themselves  above 
square  roofs  or  thrust  their  branches  between  the  walls 
of  the  crowding  architecture  —  in  spite  of  all  this  colour 
and  ornamentation,  the  prevailing  tone  of  the  sacred  city 
is  a  dull  pallid  and  lifeless  brown.  The  traveller  looks 
up  from  the  painted  barge  on  which  he  is  moving  slowly 
with  the  tide,  and  sees  above  him  an  immense  and  far- 
spreading  cluster  of  earth-coloured  walls;  and  it  seems 
to  him  that  these  walls,  piled  one  above  the  other,  have 
been  moulded  out  of  the  inland  cliff  itself,  that  they 
are  as  dry  and  arid  as  the  baked  earth  out  of  which  they 
rise,  and  that  like  that  cracked  and  mouldering  earth 
they  are  crumbling  everlastingly  away  into  the  dust  of 
ruin.  It  is  a  blistered  and  a  withered  city,  a  city  of 
melancholy  and  exhaustion,  a  dry,  thirsty,  and  suffo- 
cating city  —  a  city  which  is  like  a  mummy. 

And  yet  this  shabby  and  dilapidated  city,  because  of 
its  humanity,  presents  to  the  eye  a  picture  of  extraor- 
dinary brightness.  The  wide  and  splendid  stairs  lead- 
ing down  to  the  river's  edge  are  thronged  with  thou- 
sands of  pilgrims  dressed  in  all  the  gorgeous  colours  of 
the  sun.  The  carved  and  glittering  balconies  shine  with 
a  raiment  so  resplendent  that  one  imagines  a  king  to 
be  lodged  in  every  house.  The  landing-stages,  with 
their  poles  reflecting  sunlight,  are  packed  with  a  vast 
company  who  seem  to  be  the  actors  in  some  glorious 
pageant  waiting  to  march  forth  with  flags  and  music. 
Even  the  muddy  river,  for  the  entire  length  of  the  congre- 
gating walls,  is  thick  with  worshippers  up  to  the  waists 
in  water,  and  the  brown  and  yellow  and  black  and  choco- 
late  skins   of  these   thousand   devotees,   sparkling  with 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  137 

wet,  add  colour  and  vivacity  to  the  general  scene. 
Moreover  the  pure  air  twinkles  and  thrills  with  the 
flight  of  swallows,  the  ledges  and  sills  of  the  houses  are 
heavy  with  pigeons,  on  the  stages  and  on  the  stairs  cows 
white  as  milk  chew  the  cud  of  many-coloured  flowers, 
and  up  from  the  burning  ghats  where  their  dead  are 
given  to  the  flame  ascends  the  blue  and  silver  smoke  of 
the  Hindu's  fire  of  wood,  beautiful  and  glad.  All  is 
colour,  movement,  and  life.  The  very  water  which 
worshippers  fling  in  adoration  to  the  sun  forgets  the 
mud  of  the  river  and  becomes  the  glittering  dust  of 
diamonds.  The  pallid  brown  of  the  city  walls  swims 
into  the  lucent  blue  of  the  sky.  And  all  the  foulness 
and  melancholy,  all  the  dilapidation  and  ruin,  all  the 
squalor  and  shabbiness  of  the  holy  city  is  transmuted 
into  the  beauty  and  the  wonder  of  some  dazzling  dream 
by  the  glowing  magic  of  the  sun. 

The  scene  suggests  the  festivity  of  a  fair.  Along 
the  edge  of  the  river  one  sees  huge  umbrellas  of  bamboo 
at  every  possible  angle,  and  a  glittering  confusion  of  little 
temporary  buildings  which  are  something  like  a  tent, 
something  like  a  bathing-machine,  and  something  like 
a  market-stall.  Here  the  excited  and  chattering  pil- 
grims disrobe  for  the  river,  kneel  to  innumerable  idols, 
wring  out  their  clothes,  rub  themselves  dry,  and  laugh 
with  their  friends.  All  round  these  picturesque  shanties 
and  leaning  umbrellas  are  the  drying  garments  of  the 
worshippers,  hanging  their  lovely  colours  from  rope 
stretched  between  two  slender  poles.  Among  the 
crowding  people  move  the  fruit-sellers  with  their  red 
oranges  and  yellow  melons,  the  dusty  snake-charmers 
with    their    shabby    boxes    of    innocuous    cobras,    the 


138  OTHER  SHEEP 

indolent  sellers  of  sweets  with  their  trays  of  coloured 
sugar  hung  from  their  necks,  the  huge  and  herculean 
wrestlers,  the  emaciated  and  filthy  saint,  the  creeping 
touts  of  the  dancing  girls,  the  bhisti  with  his  dripping 
goatskin  of  water,  and  jugglers,  acrobats,  and  singers 
■ — all  of  them  variously  dressed  and  variously  noisy. 
The  air  is  filled  with  a  clamour  which  drowns  the  roucou 
of  the  pigeons.  It  is  a  cheerful  noise  —  the  noise  of  a 
fair  in  which  everybody  is  pleased  with  himself.  The 
faces  of  the  multitude  gleam  with  joy  —  white  teeth 
and  brilliant  eyes  making  a  sunshine  of  their  own.  You 
hear  a  constant  obbligato  of  happy  laughter  to  the  glee 
of  human  merriment  made  by  a  thousand  voices.  It  is 
a  jolly  scene.  It  is  like  a  French  watering-place 
crowded  wath  holiday-makers  from  Paris.  People  are 
where  they  have  longed  to  be.  The  goal  is  reached ;  the 
sun  is  shining;  and  life  is  good.  The  painted  barges 
and  little  boats  crowding  the  river  are  filled  with  pleas- 
ure-makers. 

But  in  the  midst  of  all  this  contagious  jollity,  there 
are  scenes  which  strike  horror  and  pity  at  the  heart  of 
the  traveller.  He  sees  the  dying  boy,  with  ghastly  roll- 
ing eyes  and  shrivelled  limbs,  being  carried  down  to  the 
healing  river  by  his  brothers  and  his  friends.  He  sees 
the  corpse,  wound  in  a  pretty,  flimsy  robe  and  borne  on 
a  slight  stretcher  between  slender  poles  of  bamboo,  wait- 
ing for  the  wood  to  be  piled  up  for  its  burning.  He 
sees  on  the  top  of  a  great  flight  of  stairs,  under  the 
shadow  of  a  lofty  arch,  the  disconsolate  widow  wailing 
her  loss  and  rocking  herself  to  and  fro  in  the  arms  of 
her  comforters.  He  sees  the  sweating  and  gasping  son 
swing  back  his  long  pole  to  break  the  skull  of  his  dead 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  139 

father  before  the  flames  shall  burst  it.  He  sees  little 
groups  of  all  but  naked  men  shovelling  into  the  muddy 
river  the  blackened  ashes  of  the  dead.  And  he  sees 
loathsome  humanity  exhibiting  its  deformities  and  its 
diseases  to  the  afflicted  and  distressed,  whining  for 
money  at  one  moment,  and  cursing  the  refusal  of  it  at 
the  next. 

The  juxtaposition  of  festivity  and  lamentation  is  what 
chiefly  strikes  the  observer.  The  shriek  of  the  dying 
mingles  with  the  cajoleries  of  the  conjuror,  the  wail  of 
the  widow  mingles  with  the  loud  laughter  of  a  group 
gathered  round  an  acrobat,  the  crackle  of  the  death  fire 
mingles  with  the  music  of  love  songs.  He  looks  from 
a  miserable  leper  to  see  a  gymnast  swinging  his  Indian 
clubs  in  the  sun.  He  looks  from  the  smoke  and  ash 
of  the  burning  ghat  to  see  children  in  gaudy  clothes 
playing  with  tinselled  toys.  And  while  the  stairs  and 
landing-stages  are  crowded  with  all  this  sorrow  and 
with  all  this  joy,  in  the  water  itself,  telling  their  beads, 
looking  up  to  heaven  with  a  strange  ecstasy,  or  stand- 
ing like  carven  figures  with  bowed  head,  folded  hands, 
and  moving  lips,  the  pilgrims  are  praying  to  their  gods 
and  seeking  liberation  from  their  sins. 

In  the  water,  which  is  littered  as  if  with  confetti  by 
millions  of  flower  petals  offered  to  Mother  Ganges,  you 
may  see  men  standing  at  prayer  who  startle  you  by 
their  likeness  to  the  pictures  of  Christ  —  eyes  large, 
luminous,  and  tranquil,  the  features  perfect,  the  long 
hair  falling  gracefully  about  the  neck,  the  moustache  and 
beard  leaving  the  tenderness  of  the  mouth  unhidden  — 
the  whole  face  exquisite  with  meekness  and  majestic 
with  spirit.     And  side  by  side  with  these  ascetics,  you 


I40  OTHER  SHEEP 

see  the  hard  old  man  of  handsome  but  sensual  appear- 
ance, whose  copper-coloured  skin,  stretched  and  shin- 
ing over  rolls  of  hanging  fat,  flames  in  the  sun  with  the 
challenge  of  wealth  and  power.  Such  a  man  scoops  up 
the  muddy  water  in  his  hollowed  palm  and  rubs  it  on 
his  shoulders,  down  his  arms,  and  over  his  enormous 
bosom,  with  the  action  of  one  who  is  doing  good  busi- 
ness and  would  do  it  briskly  and  heartily.  Another 
man,  thin,  bitter,  and  bird-like,  the  cords  of  his  neck 
taut  as  steel,  his  shaven  head  like  a  skull,  strides  into 
the  river  with  set  and  earnest  face,  flings  the  water  up 
into  the  air  with  an  angry  flourish  of  the  arms,  and 
seems  to  regard  the  gods  with  stern  displeasure  or  a 
masterful  contempt.  Another  man,  whose  bulbous  eyes 
and  full  lips  suggest  a  sense  of  humour,  comes  tardily 
and  self-consciously  into  the  crowded  river,  and  draw- 
ing a  deep  breath  and  pinching  his  nose  between  thumb 
and  index,  suddenly  bobs  his  head  under  the  tide  and 
comes  up  gasping  and  dripping  and  relieved.  Some 
stand  praying,  some  lift  handfuls  of  water  to  the  sky, 
some  are  rubbing  themselves  with  vigour,  some  are  sit- 
ting up  to  the  neck,  some  are  jumping  up  and  down 
like  bathers  at  the  sea,  some  are  kneeling  offering  fruit 
and  flowers  to  the  river,  some  are  shouting  jokes  to  their 
friends  on  shore,  and  some  are  lying  comatose  and 
dreadful  at  the  water's  edge  while  their  fathers  and 
mothers  anoint  them  from  the  sacred  tide.  Old  white- 
haired  men,  middle-aged  men,  mere  striplings,  and  little 
boys  —  their  skins  witnessing  to  vastly  different  climates 
and  their  features  proclaiming  vastly  different  castes  — 
an     immense     and     never-dwindling     congregation     of 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  141 

humanity  —  there  they  are  waist  deep  in  Mother  Ganges, 
seeking  communion  with  the  powers  of  the  universe  and 
a  lifting  of  the  burden  of  their  conscious  wrong. 

Just  above  these  pilgrims,  close  to  the  place  where  the 
dead  are  burning  and  the  place  where  wood  is  being  busily 
chopped  for  the  death  fires,  there  is  a  temple  guarded 
by  a  staring  notice-board  which  declares  in  English  that 
women  are  not  admitted  to  its  precincts.  The  exterior 
of  this  temple  consists  of  wood  carvings,  and  every  one 
of  the  pictiires  carved  in  the  black  wood  is  a  grinning 
obscenity.  It  is  not  possible  even  to  hint  at  the  nature 
of  some  of  these  sexual  lubricities,  but  the  reader  must 
take  my  word  for  it  that  they  are  filthy  to  a  degree 
unreached  in  the  worst  pornographic  literature  of 
Europe,  that  motherhood  is  debased  in  some  of  them 
so  vilely  that  it  might  seem  a  devil  had  done  the  work, 
and  that  in  every  one  of  these  abominable  impurities 
there  is  a  salacious  leer  and  a  lecherous  grin.  And  this 
place  is  a  temple.  As  I  moved  away  I  noticed,  at  right 
angles  from  the  temple,  a  line  of  buildings  with  iron 
railings  in  the  place  of  windows  and  doors,  like  the 
cages  in  a  menagery.  "  That,"  said  my  guide,  "  is  the 
priests'  quarter."  I  looked  into  one  of  the  cages  and 
saw  a  woman  sitting  in  the  shadow  of  the  background. 
"  She  is  the  woman  of  one  of  the  priests,"  said  my  guide. 
At  the  head  of  the  stairs  leading  down  to  the  river  we 
were  confronted  by  an  old  and  frowning  man  whose 
forbidding  face  reminded  me  of  certain  criminals  I  have 
seen  in  Wormwood  Scrubs.  He  held  out  his  hand, 
angrily  and  commandingly.  "  What  does  he  want  ?  " 
I  asked.     "  Bakshish,"  said  my  guide.     "  But  what  has 


142  OTHER  SHEEP 

he  done  ?  "  "  He  is  a  priest."  I  gave  him  nothing,  and 
he  cursed  me  in  mumbled  language  and  with  murderous 
looks. 

As  we  descended  I  said  to  my  guide,  who  was  a  young 
Brahman    and    spoke    excellent    English  — "  How    is    it 
possible  for  such  a  temple  to  stand  in  the  holy  city  of 
Hinduism?"     "I  am  sorry  to  say,"  he  replied  sadly, 
"  that  there  are  worse  things  than  that  in  Benares.     I 
do  not  like  to  tell  visitors  the  truth,  because  it  brings 
shame  to  my  religion.     But  in  this  little  city  there  are 
two   hundred   dancing  girls,    and   the   people   are   very 
wicked  —  they  are  not  good.     It  is  wrong.     It  should 
not  be.     It  is  not  our  religion."     "  But,"   I  persisted, 
"  that  temple  is  not  a  secret  sin :  it  is  a  place  of  worship; 
it  is  open  to  all  the  world ;  it  is  served  by  priests !  " 
"There  are  too  many  priests  in  Benares;  some  of  them 
are  very  wicked,"   he  answered.     "  But  this  temple  — 
does  no   one  condemn   it?  is  there  no   such  thing   in 
Benares  as  a  public  opinion?     What  I  want  to  under- 
stand, do  you  see,  is  the  unchallenged  existence  of  such 
a  place,  served  by  priests,  in  the  sacredest  city  of  India 
—  the  city  to  which  pilgrims  come  thousands  of  miles 
from  every  quarter  of  the  country,  to  rid  themselves  of 
just  those   very   sins   which   this   temple   is   erected   to 
excite  and  justify.     I  cannot  understand  how  it  is  al- 
lowed to  stand."     "  There  are  many  things  like  that." 
"  But  the  pilgrims  —  the  people  we  saw  praying  in  the 
river  and  bathing  in  the  holy  water :  they  are  in  earnest, 
they  are  not  hypocrites,  they  are  struggling  to  be  good, 
they  want  to  be  better  ? "     "  Oh,  yes,  a  few  may  come 
because  their   parents  desire   it   or   because   the   priests 
have  ordered  it;  but  most  of  them  are  seeking  libera- 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  143 

tion/'  "And  they  say  nothing  about  this  temple?" 
He  shrugged  his  shoulders  — "  They  do  not  bother  about 
it ;  and  —  they  are  afraid  of  the  priests."  "  They  know 
that  many  of  the  priests  are  wicked?"  "Everybody 
knows  that !  "  "  But  it  makes  no  difference  to  their 
faith?"  "No;  they  beHeve  their  religion."  Now,  im- 
agine such  a  temple  as  this  at  Oxford  or  Winchester  or 
Wells.  But  there  it  stands  —  in  the  centre  of  Benares, 
unchallenged,  and  guarded  by  priests. 

The  interior  of  the  city  is  scarcely  less  crowded  than 
the  riverside,  but  in  all  else  wholly  different.  Instead 
of  the  infinite  blue  of  heaven,  the  happy  sense  of  mov- 
ing water,  and  the  wide,  clean,  wholesome  air  of  un- 
broken distance,  one  finds  oneself  in  dark  and  tortuous 
streets  whose  huddled  houses,  from  their  littered  gutters 
to  their  overhanging  balconies,  reek  of  dilapidation  and 
breathe  decay.  The  ground  floors  of  these  grimy 
dwellings  are  used  for  merchandise,  and  there  one  sees, 
framed  by  the  blackened  woodwork  of  the  shop  front, 
the  grinding  of  flour,  the  hammering  of  brass,  the 
roasting  of  gram,  the  carving  of  wood,  the  stitching  of 
raiment,  the  weighing  of  meat,  and  the  forging  of  iron. 
One  interior  is  bright  with  the  tinted  sugar  of  the  con- 
fectioner or  the  gleaming  trays  and  vases  of  the  brass- 
worker:  another  is  dark  and  miserable  with  rusty  iron 
and  broken  shards.  In  one  shop,  smoking  an  enormous 
hookah,  and  clothed  in  spotless  white,  the  rich  and  cor- 
pulent merchant  lounges  against  his  carpets  or  his  fur- 
niture; next  door,  with  ragged  garments  and  sweat- 
ing arms,  the  lean  and  haggard  master  works  painfully 
beside  his  crucible  of  fire.  From  a  shabby  window 
overhead  issues  the  monotonous  but  haunting  melan- 


144  OTHER  SHEEP 

choly  of  the  tom-tom,  the  sad  twang  of  the  zither,  and 
the  rhythmic  beating  of  hands,  with  a  woman's  raucous 
voice  breaking  every  now  and  then  into  this  wailful 
music  in  a  nasal  crescendo  of  discordant  passion.  The 
trodden  earth  or  the  uneven  stones  of  the  roadway 
scarcely  show  for  the  garbage;  the  shops  and  cellars 
reek  like  rabbit  hutches;  from  wall  to  wall  the  street 
is  crowded  with  an  indolent  and  spitting  multitude;  and 
everywhere  —  buzzing  in  the  dark  air  above  the  people's 
heads,  almost  obliterating  the  meat  and  sugar  and  grain 
in  the  shops,  and  assaulting  your  face  and  neck  and 
hands  as  you  force  your  way  through  the  stench  and 
the  crowd  —  there  are  flies. 

It  is  impossible  for  any  picture  or  any  photograph  to 
convey  a  faithful  idea  of  an  Indian  city.  Two  essential 
and  ubiquitous  components  they  must  always  lack,  how- 
ever skilful  the  painter,  however  accurate  the  lens. 
One  thing  is  the  glittering  blackness  of  a  cloud  of  flies; 
the  other  —  dust.  The  flies  make  an  atmosphere  of 
their  own,  and  it  is  in  this  atmosphere  that  a  street  of 
native  houses  looms  into  vision;  it  is  an  atmosphere  as 
depressing  and  suffocating  as  fog  and  yet  as  vivacious 
and  quivering  as  the  atmosphere  of  a  summer  sea.  It 
is  an  atmosphere  that  vibrates  with  vitality,  that  shines 
and  glitters  with  incessant  movement,  and  yet  chokes 
the  soul  with  a  sense  of  loathing  and  disgust.  The  tired 
and  yawning  dealer,  squatting  on  the  counter  of  his  little 
grimy  shop  will  every  now  and  then  lazily  fan  the 
marauding  flies  from  his  evil-smelling  fish  or  his  raw 
and  bloody  meat;  and  then  they  rise  into  the  air  like 
a  cloud  of  coal-dust,  swarm  there  for  a  moment  with 
a  sickening  buzz,  and  then  descend  once  more  upon  their 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  145 

prey  —  some  of  them  settling  on  the  owner's  face  till 
it  loses  recognition,  covered  by  a  spotted  veil.  The 
string  of  mules  descending  the  declivity  of  these  steam- 
ing streets  is  accompanied  by  a  host  of  flies;  the 
bullock-carts,  loaded  with  unspeakable  things,  are  black 
with  them;  the  diseased,  the  wounded  and  the  ulcerous 
are  pursued  by  them  and  speckled  with  them  —  the  very 
houses  seem  to  throb  and  pulsate  with  the  mist  beaten 
by  these  hundred  million  wings.  Until  one  has  seen 
with  his  own  eyes  the  black  dance  of  the  buzzing  fly  in 
the  bazaar  of  an  Indian  city,  it  is  impossible  for  him 
to  visualize  that  crowding  scene  or  imagine  that  offen- 
sive air. 

With  the  flies  there  is  the  dust.  So  far  as  I  know  dust 
is  a  thing  no  painter  can  counterfeit,  and  no  camera  can 
reproduce.  I  mean  the  dust  of  architecture  —  hot  the 
clean,  sweet,  transitory  dust  of  the  open  road  or  the 
windy  field  —  but  the  old,  sour,  black,  and  abiding  dust 
of  mouldering  stone  and  crumbling  brick,  the  dust  which 
settles  upon  ledge  and  sill,  which  works  its  w^ay  into  the 
flutings  of  carved  wood,  which  is  the  pigment  and  com- 
plexion of  ancient  stone,  which  mantles  blistering  wood 
and  peeling  paint,  which  is  the  black  rime  on  the  toothed 
arches  of  dark  entries,  which  is  the  leaden  bloom  on  rusty 
lamps  and  hooded  porticoes,  which  is  the  mildew  in 
doorways  and  the  must  on  rotten  stairs  —  the  dust  of 
time,  the  dust  of  decay,  the  dust  of  death. 

How  should  a  painter,  baffled  by  the  specks  of  damp 
gold  on  a  child's  sandshoe,  express  this  shabbying  dust 
of  bitten  stone  and  nibbled  brick  which  clothes  the  habi- 
tations of  men  with  the  vesture  of  mortality  ?  And  yet, 
is    it    not   this    common    and    unpaintable    dust    which 


146  OTHER  SHEEP 

breathes  into  the  air  of  cities  the  mysterious  atmos- 
phere of  architecture?  —  is  it  not  this  grime  of  the 
ages,  this  crumbHng  away  of  magnificence  and  strength, 
which  gives  to  a  temple,  a  palace,  or  a  street  its  char- 
acter and  significance?  A  painter  may  suggest  age  and 
may  suggest  decay,  but  apparently  he  cannot  clothe  his 
picture  with  this  covering  and  tangible  garment  of  an- 
cient time.  And  a  photograph  of  a  building  old  as 
Rameses,  lacking  only  this  vesture  of  dust,  becomes  as 
contemporary  as  a  town  hall  or  a  free  library. 

I  have  been  surprised,  looking  through  the  photo- 
graphs which  I  brought  back  with  me  from  India,  by 
the  utter  failure  of  the  camera  to  give  even  the  very 
faintest  sense  of  a  city's  atmosphere  —  that  something 
on  the  walls  of  buildings  and  in  the  air  of  streets  which 
is  what  w^e  receive  into  the  mind  long  before  we  have 
begun  minutely  to  observe  or  critically  to  particularize. 
It  is  not  only  that  a  photograph  lacks  colour;  it  is  not 
only  that  a  photograph  is  unnatural  with  arrested  move- 
ment —  the  air  is  lacking,  the  character  is  wanting,  and 
the  soul  is  dead.  "  'Tis  Greece,  but  living  Greece  no 
more." 

In  all  the  cities  of  India,  but  chiefly  in  Benares,  a 
sense  of  the  crumbling  dust  of  time,  shabbying  every- 
thing and  saddening  everything,  is  essential  to  a  faith- 
ful apprehension  of  the  scene.  The  vivid  colours  of  the 
people's  clothes  and  the  garish  paint  on  the  w^oodwork 
of  the  houses,  are  seen  through  a  mist  breathing  from 
this  everlasting  dust.  And  it  Is  in  the  air  —  suffocating 
the  nostrils,  irritating  the  throat,  and  inflaming  the  eyes 
of  the  unacclimatized  European.  It  is  in  the  air,  like 
motes  in  a  shaft  of  sunlight;  it  falls  from  the  roof,  it 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  147 

ascends  from  the  road,  it  comes  from  the  rumbling 
wheels  and  swaying  pole  of  the  bullock-waggon,  from 
the  pack  on  the  laden  ass,  from  the  dark  interiors  of 
smith  and  turner,  from  the  rustle  of  feet  padding  on  the 
stones,  and  from  the  windows,  doorways,  and  balconies 
of  the  nodding  houses.  It  is  the  living  breath  of  the 
living  city. 

One  thing  more  is  essential  to  a  faithful  realization 
of  these  Indian  streets.  In  addition  to  the  breathing 
atmosphere  of  dust  and  the  myriad  dance  of  disgustful 
flies,  there  is  the  hea\'y,  pungent,  and  narcotic  smell  of 
the  East.  If  you  can  imagine  what  the  air  would  be 
like  in  a  shop  built  of  sandal-wood  and  stocked  with 
fish,  where  dirty  carpets  were  being  beaten  and  chests  of 
greasy  brass  loaded  with  pot-pourri,  you  will  be  able  to 
realize  the  floating  scents  and  drifting  odours  of  a  Na- 
tive street. 

Benares  is  perhaps  more  remarkable  for  its  dust  and 
smells  than  any  other  city  in  India.  For  in  addition  to 
its  never  ceasing  tide  of  pilgrims,  it  is  a  city  of  innumer- 
able temples,  and  many  of  these  temples  are  nothing 
more  than  stables  for  cows,  cages  for  monkeys,  hospitals 
for  the  sick,  and  common  lodging-houses  for  the  desti- 
tute. You  may  look  through  a  gorgeous  temple  door 
of  shining  brass  into  the  dusk  and  reek  of  a  stifling  in- 
terior, and  see  in  the  mephitic  gloom  a  monstrous  bull 
snufling  at  trays  piled  with  rose-petals  while  his  wor- 
shippers crowd  about  him  in  the  slime  and  steam  of  his 
ordure.  You  may  enter  the  precincts  of  another  temple, 
and  find  every  foot  of  your  progress  challenged  by  chat- 
tering monkeys  who  grab  at  your  hands  or  snatch  at 
your  clothes  for  the  food  which  is  offered  to  the  gods. 


148  OTHER  SHEEP 

And  elsewhere,  in  narrow  slums,  through  burrowing 
alleys,  and  at  filthy  corners,  you  will  come  across  dark 
and  sinister  temples  whose  tanks  of  horrible  water  are 
surrounded  by  the  scrofulous  and  the  leprous,  while  the 
broken  and  spittled  stones  of  their  pavements  are  strewn 
with  humanity  eating  its  food,  uttering  its  gossip,  and 
sleeping  away  the  fatigue  of  its  pilgrimage.  The  smells, 
the  dust,  the  dirt,  the  flies,  of  these  dark  and  twisting 
streets,  make  such  an  atmosphere  as  fill  the  mind  of  a 
European  with  loathing  and  disgust. 

But  of  all  cities  I  have  visited,  Benares  stands  in  soli- 
tary supremacy  for  interest  and  illumination.  I  do  not 
think  there  can  be  another  place  in  the  world  where  a 
man  may  see  the  soul  of  humanity  so  visibly.  Other 
cities  amuse  or  charm;  Benares  teaches.  Other  cities 
show  us  the  social  organism;  Benares,  the  individual 
soul.  In  a  single  hour,  making  a  loitering  journey  from 
the  temples  to  the  riverside,  a  man  may  learn  something 
of  the  human  soul  which  all  the  books  of  the  world 
have  failed  to  teach  him.  He  may  come  to  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  human  mind  which  he  has  not  realized  even 
from  a  profound  study  of  The  Golden  Bough  and  Hu- 
man Personality.  For  here,  visible  to  the  eye  of  sense, 
crowding  every  street,  thronging  every  stair,  and  muddy- 
ing a  great  river,  is  the  soul  of  man  seeking  rest  from 
the  burden  of  its  own  particularity,  and,  in  that  im- 
memorial quest  after  peace,  descending  to  such  outrage- 
ous folly  and  such  degrading  absurdities  as  stagger  the 
brain  of  a  rational  man  and  fill  his  mind  for  a  moment 
either  with  compassion  or  wild  contempt  for  his  own 
species. 

Again  and  again  I  said  to  myself,  looking  at  these 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  149 

pilgrims  abandoned  to  their  orgiastic  ritual,  "  Re- 
ligion is  a  degradation."  Again  and  again  I  felt  that 
Faith  is  a  peril  and  a  stumbling-block  to  the  evolution 
of  humanity.  And  long  after  I  had  escaped  from  the 
dust  and  the  flies,  the  smells  and  the  slime,  of  this  sacred 
city,  I  was  haunted  by  the  repetition  of  this  single 
thought  —  the  mind  must  act  as  if  there  is  no  God. 

For  the  supreme  lesson  taught  by  Benares  is  the 
danger  of  unreasoning  Faith.  Among  these  pilgrims 
there  are  those  who  sincerely  believe  in  God,  they  come  to 
the  Ganges  with  the  passionate  desire  to  be  cleansed 
from  sin,  they  ardently  hold  the  faith  that  God  will 
give  them  peace  at  the  end  of  this  religious  observance; 
and,  if  faith  in  God  is  pleasing  to  God,  if  aspiration  after 
cleanness  is  a  true  prayer  to  a  heaven  which  answers 
prayer,  then,  they  should  be,  these  earnest  and  passionate 
pilgrims,  as  dear  to  the  heart  of  God  and  as  secure  in 
peace  of  soul,  as  the  faithful  Catholics  and  Protestants 
of  Europe.  But  for  myself,  I  found  it  impossible  to 
think  that  any  infinite  and  perfect  Being  could  take 
pleasure  in  such  servile  abasement  and  such  childish 
superstition;  and  I  felt  that  if  heaven  must  make  choice 
between  these  children  who  have  degraded  reason,  and 
men  of  science  who  have  exalted  reason,  it  would  be  no 
heaven  that  opened  its  gates  to  the  children. 

Benares  gives  to  one  the  absolute  certainty  that  the 
evolution  of  humanity  depends  upon  reason.  The  ex- 
ercise of  this  faculty  is  of  course  essential  to  the  human 
race,  but  if  Faith  attempts  to  usurp  the  chief  place  in 
human  progress,  disaster  must  overtake  humanity.  The 
most  devout  Christian  does  surely  act  as  if  there  were 
no  God  in  moments  of  peril  and  catastrophe.     If  his 


I50  OTHER  SHEEP 

house  is  on  fire,  he  does  not  pray,  but  sends  for  the 
fire-engine.  If  his  child  is  bitten  by  a  mad  dog,  he  does 
not  pray,  but  runs  for  the  doctor.  If  his  eyes  are  fail- 
ing, he  does  not  pray,  but  consults  the  oculist.  If  his 
children  are  man}^  and  his  income  precarious,  he  does 
not  pray,  but  insures  his  life.  Pressed  to  an  honest 
confession,  the  most  earnest  and  trustful  Christian  is 
forced  to  admit  that  his  material  life  is  ordered  far  more 
by  the  exercise  of  his  rational  faculties  than  by  his  faith. 
And  if  any  man  can  read  history  with  honest  eyes,  must 
he  not  perceive  that  until  superstitious  faith  in  an  over- 
ruling and  constantly  interfering  Providence,  was  sup- 
planted by  the  masculine  resolution  to  manage  this  world 
with  human  hands,  to  manage  it  and  rule  it  by  the  in- 
genuity and  might  of  human  reason,  life  was  a  sad  and 
wasteful  and  cruel  business. 

It  is  the  divine  gift  of  Reason  which  differentiates 
mankind  from  the  animal  world;  and  wherever  Faith 
is  ascendant  over  Reason,  humanity  is  degraded  to  the 
brute  level.  Nor  does  even  the  true  Faith  serve  God 
and  Man,  when  it  maligns  Reason  for  lack  of  its  own 
quality,  since  no  one  acquainted  with  the  slow  and 
laborious  ascent  of  humanity,  measured  by  millions  of 
years,  from  magic  and  sorcery,  from  cannibalism, 
totemism,  barbarism  and  idolatry,  can  doubt  that  Rea- 
son has  ever  been  the  morning  star  of  the  human  race, 
leading  the  soul  upward  and  onward  from  a  false  and 
partial  to  a  true  and  comprehensive  knowledge  of  the 
Universe.  Reason  is  never  at  a  stop,  and  therefore  it 
can  never  formulate  a  creed.  Always  it  is  moving 
towards  fuller  knowledge  of  the  cosmic  process ;  and  with 
every  painful  step  of  its  advance  it  reveals  a  more  majes- 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  151 

tic  universe  and  fills  the  soul  with  a  deeper  and  sublimer 
reverence.  If  Reason  is  accused  of  lack  of  Faith  — 
by  those  who  participate  in  its  thousand  achievements 
—  may  it  not  justly  answer  that  to  work  is  to  pray,  and 
that  to  believe  in  the  perfecting  of  things  is  to  believe 
in  God  ? 

Certainly  the  faith  which  is  in  Hinduism  is  a  faith 
perilous  to  humanity.  To  see  a  man  standing  in  the 
muddy  river  of  Benares,  rubbing  himself  with  the  filthy 
water,  and  to  reflect  that  such  a  man  —  who  would 
surely  be  better  employed  in  stoking  a  railway-engine 
or  ploughing  a  field  —  is  convinced  in  his  brain  that 
the  depravity  of  his  heart  is  thereby  washed  away,  and 
that  he  is  giving  pleasure  to  Eternal  God  —  this  is  to  feel 
that  a  faith  which  commands  a  surrender  of  reason  is 
more  deadly  to  the  human  race  than  the  blankest  agnos- 
ticism or  the  wildest  atheism.  An  agnostic  such  as  Hux- 
ley is  surely  a  nobler,  nay  a  diviner,  representative  of 
humanity  than  these  pilgrims  to  the  Ganges.  And  the 
priests  of  the  cow  temple  or  the  monkey  temple,  though 
they  offer  sacrifices  all  day  to  the  invisible  gods,  surely 
they  are  more  dangerous  to  the  human  race  than  the 
frothiest  atheist  of  a  London  park. 

One  sees  in  this  city  not  only  the  peril  of  faith,  but 
the  inevitable  calamity  of  mysticism  carried  to  its  logical 
conclusion.  The  fakirs,  who  so  trust  God  that  they 
take  no  thought  for  the  morrow,  and  are  content  with 
the  day  when  they  have  begged  sufficient  rice  for  stom- 
ach's need,  are  no  whit  different  from  the  loose-lipped 
and  rolling-eyed  inmates  of  our  mad-houses.  Their 
faith  is  so  supreme  that  their  reasons  have  atrophied. 
They    are    stupid.     They    are    mad.     Let    any    ascetic- 


152  OTHER  SHEEP 

minded  youth,  steeped  in  the  literature  of  the  saints,  and 
inclined  to  the  belief  that  God  may  be  reached  through 
privation  of  body  and  by  meditation  of  soul,  come  to 
the  banks  of  the  Ganges  and  cleanse  himself  of  folly. 
He  ■  will  there  see  men  who  do  what  so  many  mystics 
have  enjoined,  and  who  have  become  in  the  process  de- 
humanized skeletons  and  poor  jibbering  idiots.^ 

But  chiefly,  Benares  must  be  regarded  as  a  laundry 
of  souls.  From  all  parts  of  India,  packed  like  bundles 
of  firewood  in  trains  composed  of  interminable  luggage 
vans,  riding  down  from  the  hills,  footing  it  over  dusty 
roads,  jolting  along  in  bullock- waggons  and  palanquins, 
the  mother  carrying  her  baby,  the  friends  supporting 
their  sick,  and  the  mourners  bearing  their  dying,  millions 
of  Hindus,  from  the  great  Rajahs  to  the  most  destitute 
peasants,  stream  in  a  never-ceasing  tide  through  the 
streets  of  the  holy  city,  descend  the  steep  and  broken 
stairs  to  the  filthy  river,  and  there,  with  exclamations  of 
joy  and  smiles  of  ecstasy,  wash  the  foul  linen  of  their 
dirty  minds  or  their  troubled  souls.  Look  at  it  how 
you  will,  unless  you  are  rickety  with  sentimentalism  or 
fanatical  with  hatred  of  reason,  there  is  little  but  con- 
tempt and  disgust  in  this  spectacle  of  Hindu  holiness. 
You  see  humanity  degraded  and  grovelling;  you  see  it 
laughing  with  the  joy  of  satisfaction  in  its  own  shame- 
ful degradation ;  you  see  it  —  this  humanity  formed  for 
heroic  deeds  and  capable  of  divinest  intuitions  —  grin- 
ning in  an  abasement  to  which  the  lowest  brute  and  the 
meanest  insect  have  not  fallen.  And  in  face  of  all  this 
public  and  laughing  riot  of  faith,  you  cannot  ride  away 
from  the  horror  of  it  on  the  tolerance  that  it  is  merely 
1  See  Notes,  page  353. 


THE  LAUNDRY  OF  SOULS  153 

the  outward  and  visible  form  of  some  inward  and  spirit- 
ual emotion;  you  cannot  soothe  yourself  with  the  flattery 
that  you  have  a  penetrating  and  an  understanding  soul 
because  you  see  in  all  this  hideous  ceremonial  only  the 
mystery  and  symbolism  of  a  spiritual  tragedy.  It  is 
too  public :  it  is  too  literal :  it  is  too  honest.  No ;  there 
is  nothing  of  symbolism  in  this  spectacle.  Ganges  water 
is  sacred  and  holy.  It  is  to  this  water,  this  very  water 
flowing  muddily  before  your  eyes,  that  your  symbolists 
have  brought  their  sinful  souls,  their  aching  sick,  and 
their  corrupting  dead.  It  is  Ganges  water,  not  any 
power  that  it  symbolizes,  which  will  wash  away  sin,  cure 
lepers,  and  carry  the  souls  of  the  dead  into  Paradise. 
Look  at  them,  these  holiday-making  pilgrims,  as  they 
crowd  and  fight  into  their  homeward  trains  or  take  to 
the  road  on  their  return  journey;  in  almost  every  case 
you  will  see  that  they  carry  bottles  and  jars  and  pots 
filled  with  this  holy  water.  The  Ganges  symbolizes  noth- 
ing; it  is  itself  the  laundry  of  souls,  the  hospital  for 
disease,  and  the  channel  to  Paradise.  They  take  this 
sacred  water  back  with  them  to  their  distant  villages, 
and  when  they  commit  a  sin  they  touch  themselves  with 
it,  and  when  their  children  are  sick  they  anoint  them 
with  it,  and  when  they  would  placate  a  demon  they  offer 
him  a  drink  of  it.  For  them  there  is  no  symbolism  but 
a  most  potent  magic  in  this  water.  They  regard  their 
pilgrimage  not  as  a  sacrament,  but  as  a  cure.  Benares 
is  not  theif  Zion ;  it  is  their  Marienbad. 

One  only  feeling  is  possible  to  the  just  man  who  sur- 
veys this  scene  and  can  master  his  disgust  and  bridle  his 
contempt  and  can  overcome  his  shame.  It  is  a  feeling 
of  pity. 


154  OTHER  SHEEP 

Once  more  we  realize  that  the  Children  of  India  are 
still  in  the  infancy  of  humanity;  and,  smiling  at  those 
who  would  exalt  Hinduism  to  the  pure  region  of  Phi- 
losophy or  would  bring  it  into  any  comparison  with  the 
sublime  religion  of  Jesus,  we  watch  the  Ganges  carry- 
ing down  to  the  sea  the  rose-petals  of  the  pilgrims  and 
the  ashes  of  the  dead,  and  feel  for  the  millions  of  India, 
still  living  in  the  darkness  of  superstition  and  the  shadow 
of  priestcraft,  a  sorrowful  compassion  —  the  compas- 
sion of  a  grown  man  for  a  child  terrified  by  ghost  stories 
and  afraid  of  the  dark. 

But  while  it  is  impossible  to  regard  this  bathing  of 
the  multitude  in  Mother  Ganges  as  an  act  of  symbolism, 
it  is  nevertheless  important  to  perceive  that  the  people 
are  driven  to  the  magic  of  the  river  by  a  real  and  im- 
memorial spiritual  compulsion;  and  a  consideration  of 
the  nature  of  this  compulsion  will  conduct  us  from  the 
crumbling  earthen  cliff  of  Benares  to  the  arena  of  col- 
lision where  the  spirit  of  the  East  is  at  grips  with  the 
spirit  of  the  West. 


THE  COLLISION 

There  are  people  in  Europe  who  appear  to  think  that 
the  theory  of  reincarnation  has  a  Hindu  origin;  and 
there  are  others,  less  ignorant,  who  attribute  the  first 
glimmerings  of  this  idea  to  the  mind  of  Pythagoras  or 
to  the  soul  of  Plato.  The  truth  is  that  far  more  than 
a  mere  notion  of  this  transmigration  of  souls,  rather 
a  fundamental  and  unquestioning  belief  in  the  doctrine, 
existed  among  savage  and  barbarous  people  at  the  very 
beginning  of  time.  Indeed,  one  may  almost  venture 
to  assume  that  the  first  and  earliest  belief  regarding  the 
spiritual  world  held  by  those  dim  and  shadowy  races 
who  swim  like  ghosts  in  the  mist  and  mirk  preceding 
the  classical  era,  and  whose  vigorous  descendants  are 
still  to  be  found  in  various  unhandselled  places  on  the 
globe  long  after  the  documents  of  the  classical  era  have 
become  yellowed  with  age,  was  the  assured  conviction 
that  the  traveller  returns  from  the  bourne  of  death  and 
miserably  haunts  the  inhospitable  earth  until  a  new  body 
be  born  for  his  habitation. 

It  seems,  for  instance,  that  the  ancient  and  wide- 
spread practice  of  circumcision  may  have  had  its  origin 
in  this  belief,  for  among  races  at  the  present  day  the 
severed  skin  is  carefully  hidden  in  some  secret  place 
known  only  to  the  boy  or  his  parents,  so  that  his  spirit 
after  death  may  find  in  it  the  nucleus  as  it  were  of 
another  body.     The  shedding  of  blood  in  human  sacrifices 

155 


156  OTHER  SHEEP 

may  also  have  had  its  spring  in  this  same  intuition,  for 
there  are  barbarous  tribes  in  many  quarters  of  the  world 
who  still  pour  blood  upon  the  bodies  of  their  dead  in 
the  belief  that  it  will  strengthen  departed  spirits  to  find 
new  bodies.  In  any  case,  on  the  authority  of  Dr.  J." 
G.  Frazer,  we  know  that  among  all  the  Central  Austra- 
lian tribes  "  the  belief  is  firmly  rooted  that  the  human 
soul  undergoes  an  endless  series  of  reincarnations,  the 
living  men  and  women  of  one  generation  being  nothing 
but  the  spirits  of  their  ancestors  come  to  life  again,  and 
destined  to  be  themselves  reborn  in  the  persons  of  their 
descendants." 

So  that,  far  from  being  the  fine  flower  of  Hindu  oc- 
cultism, this  notion  of  metempsychosis  or  transmigra- 
tion of  the  soul,  whether  it  be  true  or  not  —  is  a  sur- 
vival from  the  black  night  of  human  history  —  a  dream 
or  a  nightmare  bgrn  to  those  tragic  ancestors  of  every 
disease  and  every  superstition.  Terror  and  Ignorance. 
Terror  was  the  first  iDridegroom,  and  Ignorance  the  first 
i)ride,  and  from  this  Adam  and  Eve  of  humanity,  with 
many  another  credulous  and  affrighted  offspring,  came 
the  infant  Reincarnation,  no  doubt  muling  and  puking  in 
his  nurse's  arms. 

Now,  it  is  important  to  realize  the  remote  antiquity  of 
this  notion,  because  it  is  the  base  and  foundation  of 
philosophic  Hinduism.  And  it  should  also  be  borne  in 
mind  that,  although  the  evidence  is  conclusive  for  the 
notion  of  reincarnation  being  prehistoric  and  absolutely 
savage,  there  is  no  dogmatic  mention  of  it  in  Hindu  litera- 
ture till  the  post-Vedic  period,  when  with  the  Upan- 
ishads  — ''  commences  that  great  wail  of  sorrow  which, 
for  countless  ages,  has  in  India  been  rising  up  to  heaven. 


THE  COLLISION  157 

and  which,  as  time  goes  on,  will  deepen  into  the  dark- 
ness of  despair."  Apparently  the  doctrine  was  not  de- 
veloped, certainly  not  taught,  till  one  of  the  later  Sas- 
tras,  and  it  is  taught,  as  a  writer  has  been  careful  to 
point  out  to  intelligent  Indians,  in  a  book  which  teaches 
a  quite  mad  geography,  a  most  fantastical  astronomy,  and 
makes  an  absolute  Alice-in-Wonderland  of  the  serene 
and  majestic  unity  of  nature.  Therefore,  we  find  at  the 
base  of  Hinduism,  which  attempts  to  masquerade  be- 
fore Europe  as  a  profound  philosophy  and  an  esoteric 
psychology,  a  belated  enunciation  of  the  prehistoric  be- 
lief in  transmigration,  and  we  discover  that  this  "  divine  " 
revelation  was  made  by  a  very  ignorant  and  preposterous 
person. 

Until  we  apprehend  the  Indian's  attitude  towards  this 
notion  of  reincarnation  we  cannot  realize  either  the  spirit 
of  Hinduism  or  the  nature  of  the  great  conflict  now 
proceeding  between  the  religion  of  Christianity  and  the 
religion  of  Brahmanism.  It  will  therefore  be  worth 
while  to  consider  exactly  what  the  doctrine  of  trans- 
migration means  to  the  Hindu,  and  to  clear  our  minds 
of  any  whimsicalities  on  the  subject  gathered  from  the 
lucubrations  of  European  theosophists.  The  doctrine 
has  been  explained  by  one  writer  in  the  following  illus- 
tration :  — 

We  are  bound  to  our  existence  by  two  chains,  the 
one  a  golden  chain  and  the  other  an  iron  chain.  The 
golden  chain  is  virtue,  and  the  iron  chain  is  vice. 
We  perform  virtuous  actions  and  we  must  exist  in 
order  to  receive  their  reward;  w^e  perform  vicious 
actions,  and  we  must  exist  in  order  to  receive  their 


158  OTHER  SHEEP 

punishment.  The  golden  chain  is  pleasanter  than  the 
iron  one,  but  both  are  fetters,  and  from  both  should 
we  seek  to  free  our  spirit. 

Another  writer  has  expressed  himself  as  follows :  — 

The  being  who  is  still  subject  to  birth  may  at  one 
time  sport  in  the  beautiful  garden  of  a  heavenly 
world,  and  at  another  be  cut  to  a  thousand  pieces  in 
hell;  at  one  time  he  may  be  one  of  the  highest  gods 
and  at  another  a  degraded  outcast;  at  one  time  he 
may  feed  on  ambrosia  and  at  another  he  may  have 
molten  lead  poured  down  his  throat.  Alternately  he 
may  repose  on  a  couch  with  the  gods  and  writhe  on  a 
bed  of  red-hot  iron;  become  wild  with  pleasure  and 
then  mad  with  pain ;  sit  on  the  throne  of  the  gods  and 
then  be  impaled  with  hungry  dogs  around. 

*'  Transmigration,"  as  Monier  Williams  truly  says, 
"  is  the  great  bugbear,  the  terrible  nightmare  and  day- 
mare  of  Indian  philosophers  and  metaphysicians.  All 
their  efforts  are  directed  to  getting  rid  of  this  oppressive 
scare.  The  question  is  not.  What  is  truth?  Nor  is  it 
the  soul's  desire  to  be  released  from  the  burden  of  sin. 
The  one  engrossing  problem  is,  How  is  a  man  to  break 
this  iron  chain  of  repeated  existences?  How  is  he  to 
shake  off  all  personality  ?  " 

Ask  a  Hindu,  says  Dr.  Robson,  what  is  the  chief  end 
of  man's  existence,  and  he  will  answer  Liberation.  This 
is  the  answer  which  will  be  given  alike  by  the  peasant 
and  the  philosopher  of  any  of  the  Schools.  Ask  him 
what  he  means  by  Liberation,  and  he  will  say  that  it  is 
"  to  cut  short  the  eighty-four  " —  meaning  the  84  lakhs 


THE  COLLISION  159 

of  births  through  which  the  soul  may  possibly  pass  on 
its  journey  to  absorption  into  unconscious  spirit. 

There  is  absolutely  no  suggestion  in  the  Hindu  doc- 
trine of  transmigration,  no  hint  of  any  kind,  that  the 
spirit  may  ascend  on  the  stair  of  being  by  virtuous  ac- 
tions and  spiritual  hungerings  into  the  presence  of  a  lov- 
ing and  desirous  Heaven-Father.  It  is  no  stair  for  them, 
leading  either  upward  or  downward,  but  a  blank  and  aw- 
ful cul-de-sac  ending  in  annihilation.  They  refrain  from 
good  actions  for  fear  of  being  born  again  to  receive  their 
rewards,  and  they  refrain  from  bad  actions  only  for  fear 
of  being  born  again  to  receive  their  punishments.  Good 
actions  are  only  superior  to  bad  actions  because. they  en- 
tail reward  instead  of  punishment.  And  bad  actions  are 
not  so  serious  as  good  actions  because  the  priest  has  pro- 
vided the  means  of  purification. 

The  pilgrims  whom  we  saw  bathing  in  Ganges  River 
were  driven  there,  as  was  said  at  the  conclusion  of  the 
last  chapter,  by  a  spiritual  compulsion,  and*  although  the 
goal  in  view  is  not  the  Paradise  of  God  but  the  uncon- 
sciousness of  annihilation,  the  root  of  the  compulsion, 
I  feel  sure,  is  one  and  the  same  with  the  clamour  of 
the  Christian  soul,  instinctive  in  all  the  races  of  man- 
kind, for  conversion  and  new  birth.  It  is  significant 
that  the  Christ's  idea  of  palingenesis,  or  new  birth, 
should  have  its  origin  in  that  universal  unrest  of  the 
human  spirit  which  the  Hindu  philosopher  seeks  to  medi- 
cine wath  cessation  from  birth.  And  here  we  come  into 
that  tumultuous  arena  w^here  Christianity  and  Brahman- 
ism  are  wrestling  for  the  soul  of  India. 

Among  all  the  races  of  mankind  there  exists  the 
consciousness   of   something  wrong   in  life.     The   poet 


i6o  OTHER  SHEEP 

Horace  and  the  poet  Job  are  here  of  one  mind  with  the 

aborigines  of  Australia;  the  youngest  disciple  of  the 
philosopher  Nietzsche  would  here  find  himself  in  agree- 
ment with  the  most  ignorant  Kikuyu  of  East  Africa. 
Whether  a  man  looks  upon  the  universe  as  a  roaring 
piece  of  anonymous  machinery  or  sees  in  it  the  beauti- 
ful and  evolving  creation  of  a  gracious  Providence,  he 
comes  sooner  or  later  to  the  melancholy  conclusion  that 
man  is  born  to  sorrow  as  the  sparks  fly  upward.  Not 
all  the  burly  confidence  of  Walt  Whitman,  not  all  the 
studied  gallantry  of  Louis  Stevenson,  can  dry  the  uni- 
versal tears  or  drown  the  universal  sighs  of  our  suffering 
humanity.  "  For  the  world,"  says  Sir  Thomas  Browne, 
"  I  count  it  not  an  Inn,  but  an  Hospital ;  and  a  place 
not  to  live,  but  to  die  in."  "  The  supreme  and  mysteri- 
ous Power,"  says  Winwood  Reade,  "  by  whom  the  uni- 
verse has  been  created,  and  by  whom  it  has  been  ap- 
pointed to  run  its  course  under  fixed  and  invariable  law ; 
that  awful  One  to  whom  it  is  profanity  to  pray,  of  whom 
it  is  idle  and  irreverent  to  argue  and  debate,  of  whom 
we  should  never  presume  to  think  save  with  humility 
and  awe ;  that  Unknown  God  has  ordained  that  mankind 
should  be  elevated  by  misfortune,  and  that  happiness 
should  grow  out  of  misery  and  pain.  I  give  to  uni- 
versal history  a  strange  but  true  title  —  The  Martyrdom 
of  Man.  In  each  generation  the  human  race  has  been 
tortured  that  their  children  might  profit  by  their  woes. 
Our  own  prosperity  is  founded  on  the  agonies  of  the 
past.  Is  it  therefore  unjust  that  we  also  should  suffer 
for  the  benefit  of  those  who  are  to  come  ?  "  Always  there 
is  a  hope  of  something  better,  always  there  is  a  vision  of 


THE  COLLISION  i6i 

some  Promised  Land  ahead,  always  we  await  the  spark 
from  heaven  —  but  the  Present  is  full  of  disappointment 
and  distress. 

Yes,  we  await  it !  —  but  it  still  delays, 
And  then  we  suffer !  and  amongst  us  one. 
Who  most  has  suffered,  takes  dejectedly 
His  seat  upon  the  intellectual  throne; 
And  all  his  sad  experience  he 
Lays  bare  of  wretched  days; 
Tells  us  his  misery's  birth  and  growth  and  signs, 
And  how  the  dying  spark  of  hope  was  fed. 
And  how  the  breast  was  soothed,  and  how  the  head, 
And  all  his  hourly  varied  anodynes. 

"  Misery,"  cries  the  Hindu,  ''  always  accompanies  ex- 
istence. All  modes  of  existence  result  from  desire. 
There  is  no  escape  from  existence  except  by  destruction 
of  desire." 

The  conviction  that  life  is  sad,  that  whatever  a  man 
may  think,  do,  or  believe,  misery  will  assuredly  dog 
his  footsteps  from  the  cradle  to  the  death  fire,  weighs 
so  oppressively  on  the  mind  of  the  Indian  convinced  of 
reincarnation  that  he  can  see  nothing  but  wisdom  in  the 
self-inflicted  tortures  of  the  fakir  and  will  himself  go 
to  extraordinary  lengths  for  the  purpose  of  abbreviating 
the  sentence  of  his  personality.  A  fakir  will  sit  with 
clenched  hands  till  the  nails  grow  through  the  palms 
and  protrude  like  a  bird's  claws  from  the  backs;  or  he 
will  hold  an  arm  above  his  head  until  it  becomes  a  with- 
ered and  a  rigid  stump.  And  the  ordinary  Hindu  will 
perform  monotonous  ceremonies,  offer  food  to  idols, 
make  pilgrimage  to   sacred  rivers  and  sacred   shrines. 


i62  OTHER  SHEEP 

shave  his  head,  cover  his  brow  with  ashes,  paint  his 
chest  and  arms,  and  even  eat  the  excrement  of  the  cow, 
rather  than  imperil  his  chance  of  a  short  cut  to  ever- 
lasting oblivion.  At  the  base  of  all  his  thought  con- 
cerning life  and  the  universe,  is  the  conviction  that  ex- 
istence is  sorrowful. 

Now,  a  man  would  think  that  to  a  people  so 
plunged  in  the  abyss  of  misery,  so  sunken  in  the  slough 
of  despond,  so  overshadowed  by  the  dark  mountain  of 
despair,  the  good  news  of  the  Christ  would  sound  as  a 
trumpet.     Think  of  the  words:  — 

/  am  come  that  they  might  have  Life  and  that  they 

might  have  it  more  abundantly. 
He  that  cometh  unto  Me  shall  never  hunger,  and  he 

that  believeth  in  Me  shall  never  thirst. 
Come  unto  Me  all  ye  that  are  weary  and  heavy-laden. 
I  am  the  Light  of  the  World. 
These  words  have  I  spoken  unto  you  that  My  Joy 

might  remain  in  you,  and  that  your  Joy  might  he 

full. 

Think  of  the  revelation  that  God  is  a  Father,  that  this 
Father  so  cares  for  humanity  that  the  very  hairs  of  our 
heads  are  numbered,  that  He  desires  no  ceaseless  sacri- 
fice and  no  monotonous  ceremonial,  but  only  the  love  of 
our  hearts;  and  that,  loving  mankind  as  a  father  loves 
his  children,  He  has  prepared  for  those  who  respond  to 
this  love  with  the  simple  love  of  their  human  hearts,  a 
Kingdom  of  everlasting  joy  and  felicity. 

Does  it  not  seem  to  us  that  such  wonderful  and  shin- 
ing good-news  would  be  hailed  with  a  shout  of  thanks- 


THE  COLLISION  163 

giving  by  these  millions  of  self-torturing  souls  afraid  of 
death  and  afraid  of  birth? 

Why  is  it,  then,  that  the  Darkness  of  Asia  withstands 
and  repels  the  Light  of  the  World? 

The  answer  to  this  question,  if  fully  given,  would 
lead  us  far  from  India  and  carry  us  into  the  stifling  at- 
mosphere of  European  theology,  where  Italian  priests, 
German  scholars,  French  philosophers  and  English  mor- 
alists are  still  shattering  the  peace  of  Galilee  in  their 
struggle  for  the  Keys  of  Peter.  But  the  answer  must 
be  given  if  only  in  brief,  and  fortunately  the  truth  of  it 
is  so  reasonable  and  apparent  that  it  can  almost  be  com- 
pressed into  an  epigram. 

Christianity  is  rejected  by  Brahmanism  not  as  the 
noblest  thesis  of  Optimism,  but  as  an  inferior  thesis  of 
Pessimism.  Brahmanism  considers,  and  justly,  that  its 
own  ancient  philosophy  of  Pessimism  is  superior  to  Cler- 
icalism's modern  philosophy  of  Pessimism.  It  has  no 
knowledge  of  Christianity  as  the  gospel  of  Optimism. 
It  rejects  not  the  Heaven-Father  of  Jesus,  but  the  hostile 
God  of  the  priest  Who  must  be  propitiated  and  concili- 
ated. It  rejects  not  the  love  of  God  Who  asks  only 
for  the  love  of  His  children,  but  the  capricious  arbitrari- 
ness of  a  God  Who  has  made  the  immense  hazards  of 
heaven  and  hell  to  turn  upon  intellectual  assent  to  a  set 
of  theological  dogmas. 

The  answer  to  our  question.  Why  does  the  Dark- 
ness of  Asia  withstand  and  repel  the  Light  of  the  World? 
is  another  question  —  Does  Christianity,  in  Europe  or 
in  Asia,  represent  Jesus  as  the  Light  of  the  World?  — 
is  it  a  religion  of  joy  or  a  religion  of  sorrow? 

I  think  the  reader  will  perceive  what  I  mean  if  I  com- 


i64  OTHER  SHEEP 

that  God  knows  our  needs  before  we  express  them,  and 
that  like  a  father  He  delights  to  give  us  what  we  need 
for  our  bodies  and  our  souls.  "  When  ye  pray,"  said 
the  Master,  "  use  not  vain  repetitions,  as  the  heathen 
do:  for  they  think  that  they  shall  be  heard  for  their 
much  speaking.  Be  not  ye  therefore  like  unto  them: 
for  your  Father  knoweth  what  things  ye  have  need  of, 
before  ye  ask  Him.  .  .  .  Consider  the  lilies  of  the 
field  ...  if  God  so  clothe  the  grass  of  the  field, 
which  to-day  is  and  to-morrow  is  cast  into  the  oven, 
shall  He  not  much  more  clothe  you,  O  ye  of  little  faith? 
Therefore  take  no  thought,  saying.  What  shall  we  eat? 
.  .  .  for  your  heavenly  Father  knoweth  that  ye  have 
need  of  all  these  things."  Now,  compare  this  wonder- 
fully beautiful  and  reasonable  idea  of  a  Father-Creator, 
ever  mindful  of  His  Earth  Children,  with  the  ritualist's 
attitude  towards  a  far-off  and  estranged  God  constantly 
demanding  sacrifice  and  entreaty,  from  timid  and  fright- 
ened worshippers. 

But  for  the  present  moment  it  remains  to  point  out 
that  the  unrest  in  India  is  not  truly  political  but  religious, 
and  that  its  roots  are  buried  in  that  immemorial  pes- 
simism of  Asia  which  we  have  seen  to  be  the  base  and 
foundation  of  Hinduism.  Spiritual  unrest  is  the  true 
arena  of  controversy,  and  it  is  over  the  weary  body  of 
this  unrest  that  Brahmanism  and  Christianity  are  wrest- 
ling for  the  soul  of  India. 

Education  has  shaken  the  faith  of  millions  of  people 
in  the  superstitions  of  Hinduism.  There  are  almost  as 
many  sceptics  and  agnostics  in  the  schools  and  colleges 
of  India  as  in  the  universities  of  France  and  Germany. 
But  whereas  the  agnostic  in  Europe  rises   with  relief 


THE  COLLISION  165 

from  his  moribund  ecclesiasticism  to  live  what  he  would 
consider  the  full  and  exciting  life  of  an  optimistic  ma- 
terialist, the  young  sceptic  of  Bombay,  Calcutta  and 
Lahore  rises  only  from  his  idols  and  his  ceremonies, 
and  continues  in  the  enervating  and  will-paralysing  cli- 
mate of  India  a  pessimist  convinced  that  misery  accom- 
panies existence.  That  is  to  say,  he  casts  off  the  religion 
of  Hinduism  but  not  its  philosophy.  Imagine  the  un- 
rest and  dreary  aimlessness  of  such  a  mind.  Is  it  not 
in  this  spirit  that  the  decadents  of  modern  Europe  — 

Who  hesitate  and  falter  life  away, 

And  lose  to-morrow  the  ground  won  to-day, 

go  to  their  ruin?  No  faith  in  God,  and  a  conviction 
that  life  is  a  meaningless  martyrdom!  —  what  can  be  the 
worth  of  such  a  personality,  and  what  its  end?  Cer- 
tainly for  the  Indian,  so  childlike  and  leaning,  such  a 
condition  is  perilous  beyond  the  power  of  words  to  ex- 
press. He  loses  the  support  of  authority,  he  strips  him- 
self of  tradition,  and  naked  to  the  storms  of  adversity 
and  the  slings  and  arrows  of  outrageous  fortune,  he 
stands  repeating  his  Miserere  of  Pessimism  to  the  un- 
heeding stars  and  the  silence  of  eternity.  Better  for 
him  if  he  could  still  believe  that  there  is  peace  in  Ganges 
water  and  magic  in  the  Brahman's  charm,  better  if  he 
could  still  paint  his  forehead  with  the  sign  of  Vishnu 
or  Siva  and  go  to  the  temple  with  his  offering  of  fruit 
and  flowers,  better,  far  better,  if  he  could  still  believe 
that  the  universe  is  congregated  with  the  powers  of  good 
and  evil  contending  for  his  spirit  —  anything  rather 
than  this  paralysis  of  will,  this  emptiness  of  the  heart, 
this  death  of  the  soul. 


i66  OTHER  SHEEP 

Unrest !  —  do  not  I  pray  you  think  of  Indian  unrest 
as  a  new  school  in  politics  or  a  new  form  of  treason, 
these  things  are  but  the  untimely  fruit  of  the  Asian 
Igdrasil,  whose  roots  strike  deep  into  the  past  of  Man 
and  whose  branches  stretch  upwards  to  the  sky  of  his 
dim  future.  The  unrest  of  India  is  the  shaken  idol  and 
the  troubled  priest,  it  is  the  torn  mantra  and  the  broken 
thread.  All  through  the  history  of  India,  as  indeed,  all 
through  the  history  of  every  nation  under  the  sun,  there 
has  been  this  ground-swell  of  disquiet  and  unrest,  this 
hidden  tide  of  travail  and  disenchantment.  The  world 
has  never  been  quiescent  and  humanity  has  never  stood 
still.  Always  the  earth  has  been  sweeping  through  the 
fields  of  light,  and  always  humanity  has  been  moving 
from  the  darkness  of  its  ignorance  and  out  of  the  shadow 
of  its  inexperience,  into  new  knowledge  and  new  un- 
certainty. The  long  past  behind  us,  where  so  many 
have  marched  and  so  few  have  bivouac'd,  is  strewn  with 
the  dust  of  witchcraft,  the  ashes  of  idols,  and  the  bones 
of  slaughtered  gods.  It  is  a  road  still  wet  with  the 
blood  of  martyrs  and  the  tears  of  disillusion.  Hope 
and  a  sublime  confidence  have  carried  the  kings  of 
humanity  ahead  of  the  race  and  they  have  sung  to  men 
of  kingdoms  in  nature  so  wide  and  majestic  that  it  is  an 
ecstasy  to  breathe  that  heavenly  air;  but  always  there 
have  been  mourners  at  the  broken  altar  and  always  dim 
multitudes  of  the  human  race  have  loitered  round  the 
shrine  deserted  by  its  god. 

The  present  agnosticism  in  India  has  been  widened  by 
education,  but  its  origin  belongs  to  Christianity.  The 
missionaries  of  the  Christian  religion  have  done  a  work 
in  India  only  comparable  with  the  achievement  of  the 


THE  COLLISION  167 

first  apostles  in  Europe.  They  have  not  converted  Brah- 
manism  into  Christianity,  but  they  have  begun  the  Chris- 
tianization  of  Brahmanism.  They  have  not  changed  the 
altar  of  the  gods  into  the  altar  of  Jehovah,  but  they  have 
erected  ovef  that  altar  the  decalogue  of  Christian  mor- 
als. In  a  word,  they  have  lifted  up  in  the  empire  of 
superstition  and  idolatry,  the  ethical  ideal  of  civilization 
which  is  the  Character  of  Jesus. 

This  is  not  merely  a  conviction  from  my  own  observa- 
tion and  studies,  but  the  settled  opinion  of  the  first  minds 
now  directing  the  Government  of  India.  I  find  that 
every  man  in  a  high  and  responsible  position,  in  a  posi- 
tion which  enables  him  to  survey  the  whole  various  field 
of  Indian  life  as  it  is  manifesting  itself  over  his  own 
province,  holds  the  opinion  that  a  revolution  of  a  most 
significant  character  is  now  taking  place  in  Indian 
thought,  and  that  this  revolution  is  the  work  of  Christi- 
anity. There  are  those  who  think  that  this  revolution 
is  all  for  the  good  of  India,  others  who  regard  it  with 
misgiving;  but  not  a  single  man  I  consulted  of  all  those 
able  to  form  a  correct  judgment,  expressed  any  doubt 
whatever  as  to  the  reality  and  enormous  importance  of 
the  revolution. 

Christianity,  helped  by  education  and  the  presence  of 
a  Government  more  democratic  and  more  socialistic  than 
any  Government  in  Europe,^  has  succeeded  in  that  very 
direction  where  Buddhism  failed,  and  where  modern 
Hinduism  appeared  to  be  least  vulnerable.  Christianity 
has  given  India  the  sense  of  human  brotherhood  and 
the  idea  of  social  ethics.  The  immemorial  theory  of 
Caste  is  definitely  challenged,  the  Brahman's  contempt 

1  See  page  328. 


i68  OTHER  SHEEP 

for  the  poor  is  now  regarded  with  new  eyes,  and  genuine 
shame  is  felt  for  Hinduism's  neglect  of  ignorance  and 
its  indifference  to  suffering.  The  collision  of  Christi- 
anity and  Brahmanism  has  resulted  thus  far  in  a  new 
birth  for  Hinduism,  but  not  a  new  birth  .unto  Christ. 
The  grave  of  Hinduism  has  become  a  cradle,  but  not 
the  manger  of  Bethlehem.  Hinduism  is  now  a  child 
destroying  the  idols  which  were  once  its  toys  but  its 
forehead  is  not '  marked  with  the  sign  of  the  Cross. 
Christianity  has  begun  to  moralize  Hinduism,  a  superb 
achievement,  but  it  has  not  spiritualized  Hinduism  with 
the  joy  and  serenity  of  Jesus. 

In  a  private  letter  written  to  me  by  one  of  the  Gov- 
ernors in  India,  the  prophecy  is  ventured  that  the  In- 
dian Census  Report  for  the  present  year  will  witness 
to  a  more  extensive  work  of  conversion  than  in  the 
previous  decade,  and  he  speaks  of  high-caste  Indian 
Christians  who  are  sincerely  religious.  "  But  as  a  rule," 
he  writes,  "  it  must  be  admitted  that  direct  success  in 
the  way  of  conversion  is  attained  among  the  lower  orders 
of  the  population,  and  it  is  most  easily  effected  among 
jungle  tribes  and  low  castes."  After  referring  to  a  par- 
ticular Mission  which  "  baptizes  anybody  who  asks  for 
it,"  he  gives  me  the  written  opinion  of  an  able  man  of 
affairs  and  a  close  student  of  ethnological  questions,  on 
the  subject  of  Christianity's  indirect  effects  on  Hin- 
duism : 

Apart  from  direct  conversion.  Missionary  enter- 
prise has  had  enormous  indirect  results.  There  is  one 
small  sect,  the  Radha  Swami,  which  has  actually  de- 
veloped a  doctrine  bearing  the  closest  resemblance  to 


THE  COLLISION  169 

that  of  the  Trinity.  Some  elements  were  already  ex- 
isting in  the  Kabir  Panthi  tenets  which,  according  to 
Grierson,  were  taken  directly  from  Christianity  some 
centuries  ago,  but  the  modern  development  is  much 
closer.  What  strikes  one  most  however  is  the  tend- 
ency among  Hindus  to  study  Christianity  not  as  the 
Eclectic  Brahmos  to  absorb  what  is  best  in  its  reli- 
gious teaching,  but  to  ascertain  the  secret  of  its  success 
and  apply  the  results  to  strengthen  Hinduism.  Such 
a  tendency  is  most  marked  in  the  case  of  the  Arya 
Samaj.  This  sect  has  been  influenced  for  good  in  its 
social  and  ethical  aspects  by  contact  with  Christianity. 
Its  rejection  of  caste  (theoretical  at  present)  and  all 
ritual  is  also  probably  strengthened  by  the  same 
contact,  but  in  purely  religious  matters  its  attitude 
towards  Christianity  is  direct  hostility.  It  has  bor- 
rowed the  Missionary  system  but  confines  its  converts 
to  Hindus  or  persons  whose  ancestors  were  Hindus. 
The  few  instances  of  Europeans  who  have  joined  it 
need  not  be  taken  seriously.  Thus  it  may  be  said 
generally  that  one  great  effect  of  Missionary  work  has 
been  to  excite  religious  zeal  among  the  mass  of  In- 
dians, but  to  this  must  be  added  the  warning  that  the 
zeal  so  roused  is  directed  towards  the  improvement  of 
indigenous  creeds,  not  towards  an  acceptance  of 
Christianity. 


r    <i 


I  may,  in  confirmation  of  what  is  said  above," 
writes  the  Governor,  ''mention  that  a  very  bitter  attack 
is  made  upon  Christianity  by  Munshi  Ram,  the  head  of 
the  Kangri  Gurukul,  and  his  co-editor  of  the  Vindica- 
tion of  the  Arya  Samaj.     The  Arya  Samaj  is  hostile  to 


170  OTHER  SHEEP 

all  existing  religions  in  the  East,  to  Muhamadanism, 
Orthodox  Hinduism,  Buddhism,  but  it  reserves  its  most 
violent  attacks  for  Christianity." 

Another  Governor  told  me  that  Christianity  in  his 
province  had  done  little  more  than  create  a  spirit  of 
agnosticism  among  the  educated  young  people  in  large 
towns,  "  and  this,  of  course,"  he  added,  "  is  all  to  the 
good."  It  is  good  only  so  far  as  it  represents  a  break 
with  superstition;  so  far  as  it  tends  to  deepen  and 
intensify  the  unrest  of  India's  heart,  it  is  extremely 
perilous. 

The  position  as  it  stands  at  present  is  this :  From  the 
work  of  the  Missions  a  knowledge  of  the  Character  of 
Jesus  has  penetrated  educated  opinion;  this  knowledge, 
affecting  national  ideas  on  many  subjects,  has  driven  the 
arrogant  and  self-satisfied  Brahman  to  become  a  violent 
missionary  for  Brahmanism;  it  has  created  a  new  re- 
ligion of  Hinduism  among  the  more  liberal  and  enlight- 
ened minds  of  the  community,  and  has  given  zeal  and 
enterprise  to  the  religious  conscience  of  the  people. 
Leave  out  of  count  for  the  present  the  wonderful  and 
moving  conversions  of  Christianity  among  the  humble 
and  meek,  the  poor  and  lowly,  the  unhappy  and  the  out- 
cast —  conversions  which  should  inspire  the  courage  of 
Christendom  and  lead  to  a  fresh  enthusiasm  for  the  re- 
ligion of  Jesus;  leave  these  conversions  out  of  count  for 
the  present,  and  the  position  is  what  I  have  stated  it  tc 
be  —  a  revivified  Hinduism,  a  new  activity  in  religioUv 
thought,  and  a  Brahmanism  roused  and  oppugnant. 

One  of  the  Indians  with  whom  I  discussed  this  matter, 
a  scholar,  the  principal  of  an  important  college,  and  one 
of  the  leaders  of  the  Brahmo  Samaj,  told  me  that  Chris- 


THE  COLLISION  171 

tianity  was  doing  a  great  work  for  Hinduism.  "  Your 
science  has  helped  us,"  he  said,  "  to  understand  the  phys- 
ical universe,  your  literature  has  broadened  our  minds 
and  deepened  our  sympathies,  but  Christianity  has  per- 
haps done  more  than  these  in  recalling  us  to  the  great 
ethical  truths  of  our  own  religion.  We  now  perceive 
that  the  longing  of  man  is  for  the  Infinite;  we  go  back 
to  our  ancient  books  and  we  find  that  our  forefathers 
longed  for  the  Infinite;  and  we  know,  as  the  best  of  our 
people  have  always  known,  that  communion  with  the 
Infinite  is  possible  to  man  and  does  not  demand  the  inter- 
ference of  the  priest.  We  have  a  great  reverence  for 
Jesus ;  we  feel,  with  Emerson,  that  He  '  saw  with  open 
eye  the  mystery  of  the  soul ' ;  we  confess  that  He  re- 
vealed the  noblest  truths;  and  we  acknowledge  the  great 
debt  owed  to  Him  by  all  humanity.  But  we  do  not 
call  Him  God.  We  could  not  do  that.  We  shudder  at 
the  claim  Christianity  makes  for  Him.  We  do  not  see 
from  the  Bible  that  He  made  that  claim  for  Himself. 
As  a  Teacher,  He  teaches  us;  as  a  Light,  He  shines  be- 
fore us;  as  a  Voice  from  God,  we  listen  to  Him  with 
reverence  and  with  gladness.  But  we  do  not  say  He 
was  God.  We  do  not  say  He  was  the  Infinite.  Cer- 
tainly we  reject  all  the  ritual  and  ceremonial  of  ecclesias- 
tical Christianity,  just  as  we  reject  all  the  ritual  and 
ceremonial  of  our  own  priestly  Brahmanism." 

The  following  information  given  to  me  by  a  man  well 
acquainted  with  the  facts,  concerns  a  University  Hostel 
in  the  United  Provinces :  — 

The  Hostel  is  managed  by  a  Warden,  sub- Warden 
and  two  Residents,  all  Englishmen,  the  first  two  being 


172  OTHER  SHEEP 

clergymen.  Students  visit  the  staff  for  individual 
Bible  study  two  or  three  times  a  week.  The  attend- 
ance for  this  purpose  is  purely  voluntary  and  no  special 
privileges  are  allowed  to  students  who  do  so  attend. 
For  a  time  there  was  a  boycott  of  Bible  study,  but  ex- 
cept during  that  interval  about  half  the  students  and 
generally  more  than  half  have  attended.  Most  of  the 
students  are  Brahman,  but  the  popularity  of  the  Hostel 
is  shown  by  the  fact  that  every  year  four  applications 
are  rejected  for  each  admission.  Now,  during  the  ten 
years  for  which  this  Hostel  has  existed  450  students 
have  resided  in  it,  and  there  has  been  one  baptism 
and  one  other  case  of  conversion  though  the  convert 
finally  shirked  an  open  profession.  ...  It  is 
obvious  that  parents,  while  they  recognize  the  advan- 
tages of  their  son's  honest  guidance,  have  no  fears  of 
the  latter  losing  their  own  religion.  The  caste  Hindu 
has  a  firm  belief  in  the  perfection  of  his  religion  at 
some  remote  past  and  thinks  that  that  past  is  capable 
of  return. 

Mr.   thinks,   and   I   agree   with   him,   that   if 

Christianity  ever  does  prevail  in  India  it  will  come 
from  below.  If  Hinduism  remains  as  it  is,  Christi- 
anity may  spread  rapidly  when  education  increases 
among  the  low  castes.  //,  however,  Hinduism  is 
liberalised,  as  for  example  on  the  lines  of  the  Arya 
Samaj,  Mr. thinks  that  it  is  quite  capable  of  hold- 
ing its  own.  I  go  a  little  further  than  he  does,  and  so 
far  as  one  can  attempt  to  look  forward  in  such  a  mat- 
ter, it  seems  to  me  almost  certain  that  in  such  condi- 
tions it  will  hold  its  own. 


THE  COLLISION  173 

Now,  in  conclusion  of  this  present  chapter,  I  must  take 
leave  to  caution  the  reader  against  thinking  that  this 
fermentation  of  religious  ideas  is  general  to  the  various 
peoples  composing  the  Indian  Empire.  It  is  limited  to 
an  extremely  Little  Flock  —  to  the  educated.  But  just 
as  the  ideas  of  the  educated  in  Europe  percolate  by  some 
mysterious  process  to  the  least  intellectual  circles  of  our 
complex  society,  so  that  the  mind  of  an  uncultured  and 
inarticulate  democracy  is  sometimes  actually  in  advance 
of  orthodox  opinion,  and  has  broader  vision  and  nobler 
horizons  than  the  conservatism  and  traditionalism  of 
classes  far  less  ignorant,  so  in  India  one  is  conscious 
of  a  general  disturbance  of  the  mental  atmosphere  and 
feels  that  the  leaven  of  new  ideas  is  working  towards 
a  revolution  which  will  one  day  be  total  and  complete. 
However,  at  the  present  time,  the  fermentation  which 
is  visible  and  tangible  and  audible,  the  fermentation  which 
is  engulfing  gods  and  sapping  the  foundations  of  human 
faith  in  a  spiritual  destiny,  is  restricted  to  the  cities  and 
even  there  is  only  active  among  the  young  and  the  mid- 
dle-aged. 

The  human  millions  of  India  still  inhabit  a  darkness 
such  as  brooded  over  the  whole  earth  in  the  dim  ages 
of  mortality's  first  ascent  into  the  field  of  consciousness. 
They  show  the  student  of  evolution  some  of  the  very 
earliest  stages  in  the  advance  of  humanity.  They  teach 
us  to  know  ourselves  as  we  were  before  the  dawn  of 
Christianity  and  the  rise  of  science.  They  witness  to  the 
steadying  and  most  important  fact,  that  evolution  is  not 
a  process  independent  of  mankind,  not  a  universal  ad- 
vance of  human  nature,  not  a  propulsion  of  spiritual 
forces  exerted  on  all  the  peoples  of  the  earth  simultane- 


174  OTHER  SHEEP 

ously  and  with  equal  force,  but  a  process  peculiar  to  cer- 
tain races,  dependent  absoltitely  on  the  exercise  of  the 
rational  faculty,  and  demanding  a  contintial  effort  and  a 
perpetual  rigour  of  the  moral  nature. 

It  is  proved  so  far  as  anything  which  concerns  the 
earliest  ages  of  evolution  can  be  proved,  that  ■Magic  pre- 
ceded Religion.  There  were  witches  before  there  were 
priests,  and  magicians  before  there  were  kings.  This 
is  the  great  and  illuminating  thesis  of  The  Golden  Bough ^ 
a  book  which  more  than  any  other  work  of  man  gives 
to  the  mind  such  a  sense  of  its  own  immemorial  an- 
tiquity that  it  evermore  thinks  in  ?eons  and  anticipates 
no  finality.  Dr.  Frazer  has  demonstrated  that  far  back 
in  the  abyss  of  time  man  in  his  savage  state  first  be- 
lieved himself  capable  of  controlling  natural  objects,  and 
that  it  was  only  after  a  long  experience  of  nature's  in- 
dift'erence  to  spell  and  talisman,  that  the  more  intelli- 
gent rose  to  a  conception  of  creatures  bigger  and  stronger 
than  himself  who  controlled  the  world  from  an  invisi- 
ble altitude  or  an  unfathomable  depth.  Thus  came  Re- 
ligion, superstitious  Religion,  and  Religion  permeated 
with  the  spirit  of  !Magic.  And  to  the  present  day,  not 
only  in  India  but  throughout  the  world  and  at  the  very 
heart  of  civilization,  and  in  the  purest  religion  known 
to  history,  this  earliest  faith  of  the  human  race  persists 
and  is  ever  at  war  with  the  spirit  of  evolution. 

When  we  surv^ey  the  existing  races  of  mankind  from  Green- 
land to  Tierra  del  Fuego,  or  from  Scotland  to  Singapore,  we 
observe  that  they  are  distinguished  one  from  the  other  by  a 
great  variety  of  religions,  and  that  these  distinctions  are  not, 
so  to  speak,  merely  coterminous  with  the  broad  distinctions  of 
race,  but  descend  into  the  minuter  subdivisions  of  states  and 


THE  COLLISION  175 

commonwealths,  nay,  that  they  honeycomb  the  town,  the  vil- 
lage and  even  the  family,  so  that  the  surface  of  society  all 
over  the  world  is  cracked  and  seamed,  sapped  and  mined  with 
rents  and  fissures  and  yawning  crevasses  opened  up  by  the 
disintegrating  influence  of  religious  dissension.  Yet  when  we 
have  penetrated  through  these  differences,  which  affect  mainly 
the  intelligent  and  thoughtful  part  of  the  community,  we  shall 
find  underlying  them  all  a  solid  stratum  of  intellectual  agree- 
ment among  the  dull,  the  weak,  the  ignorant,  and  the  super- 
stitious, who  constitute,  unfortunately,  the  vast  majority  of 
mankind.  One  of  the  great  achievements  of  the  nineteenth 
century  was  to  run  shafts  down  into  this  low  mental  stratum 
in  many  parts  of  the  world,  and  thus  to  discover  its  sub- 
stantial identity  everywhere.  It  is  beneath  our  feet  —  and  not 
very  far  beneath  them  —  here  in  Europe  at  the  present  day,  and 
it  crops  up  on  the  surface  in  the  heart  of  the  Australian 
wilderness  and  wherever  the  advent  of  higher  civilization  has 
not  crushed  it  under  ground.  This  universal  faith,  this  truly 
Catholic  creed,  is  a  belief  in  the  efficacy  of  magic.  While 
religious  systems  differ,  not  only  in  different  countries,  but  in 
the  same  country  in  different  ages,  the  system  of  sympathetic 
magic  remains  everywhere  and  at  all  times  substantially  alike 
in  its  principles  and  practice.  Among  the  ignorant  and  super- 
stitious classes  of  modern  Europe  it  is  very  much  what  it  was 
thousands  of  years  ago  in  Egypt  and  India,  and  what  it  now 
is  amongst  the  lowest  savages  surviving  in  the  remotest  cor- 
ners of  the  world.  The  Golden  Bough,  Third  Edition,  Chap. 
IV,  pp.  235-236. 

The  learned  author  in  another  part  of  his  book  makes 
the  following  translation  from  Dr.  W.  Caland's  Altin- 
disches  Zahher-ritual,  mentioning  that  some  good  au- 
thorities hold  that  the  very  name  of  Brahman  is  derived 
from  brahman,  "  A  magical  spell  "  :  — 

He  who  has  been  wont  to  regard  the  ancient  Hin- 
dus   as    a   highly    civilized    people,    famed    for   their 


176  OTHER  SHEEP 

philosophical  systems,  their  dramatic  poetry,  their  epic 
lays,  will  be  surprised  when  he  makes  the  acquaint- 
ance of  their  magical  ritual,  and  will  perceive  that 
hitherto  he  has  known  the  old  Hindu  people  from  one 
side  only.  He  will  find  that  he  here  stumbles  on  the 
lowest  strata  of  Vedic  culture,  and  will  be  astonished 
at  the  agreement  between  the  magic  ritual  of  the  old 
Vedas  and  the  shamanism  of  the  so-called  savage.  If 
we  drop  the  peculiar  Hindu  expressions  and  technical 
terms,  and  imagine  a  shaman  instead  of  a  Brahman, 
we  could  almost  fancy  that  we  have  before  us  a  mag- 
ical book  belonging  to  one  of  the  tribes  of  the  North 
American  red-skins. 

Dr.  Frazer  is  careful  to  remind  his  reader  that  the 
barbarous  influence  of  faith  in  Magic  is  not  confined  to 
India,  to  North  America,  to  the  centres  of  Africa  and 
Australia,  but  is  present  in  the  most  civilized  countries 
and  makes  itself  evident  even  in  the  religions  which  have 
done  most  to  overthrow  its  dominion.  While  we  prop- 
erly adjudge  Brahmanism  to  be  a  form  of  Magic,  we 
should  do  well,  therefore,  to  examine  our  own  religion 
and  see  how  far  this  ancient  superstition  is  recurring 
and  so  dragging  back  a  pure  faith  in  a  spiritual  religion 
to  the  ceremonialism  and  idolatry  of  a  savage  past. 
Most  important  is  it  for  us  to  make  this  examination, 
before  we  send  emissaries  of  our  religion  to  convert  the 
races  who  are  still  plunged  in  the  night  of  superstition 
and  whose  priests  know  more  about  Magic  than  our 
missionaries  are  able  to  tell  them,  and  whose  ceremonies 
are  more  full-blooded  with  thorough-going  belief  in  ritual 


THE  COLLISION  177 

than  anything  that  the  most  ransacking  medisevalist  can 
discover  or  invent. 

In  the  following  quotation  from  Dr.  Frazer's  work 
the  reader  will  perceive  how  easily  Magic  may  become 
associated  w^ith  Christianity  and  will  realize  with  what 
wisdom  the  great  men  and  the  great  poets  of  Israel, 
guarding  the  glory  of  their  faith  in  a  Spiritual  God,  set 
themselves  to  crush  and  extirpate  its  menace  in  the  form 
of  idolatry  or  in  the  shape  of  priestcraft :  — 

Among  the  ignorant  classes  of  modern  Europe  the  same 
confusion  of  ideas,  the  same  mixture  of  religion  and  magic, 
crops  up  in  various  forms.  Thus  we  are  told  that  in  France 
"  the  majority  of  the  peasants  still  believe  that  the  priest 
possesses  a  secret  and  irresistible  power  over  the  elements. 
By  reciting  certain  prayers  which  he  alone  knows  and  has  the 
right  to  utter,  yet  for  the  utterance  of  which  he  must  after- 
wards demand  absolution,  he  can,  on  an  occasion  of  pressing 
danger,  arrest  or  reverse  for  a  moment  the  action  of  the 
eternal  laws  of  the  physical  world.  The  winds,  the  storms, 
the  hail,  and  the  rain  are  at  his  command  and  obey  his  w411. 
The  fire  also  is  subject  to  him,  and  the  flames  of  a  conflagration 
are  extinguished  at  his  word."  For  example,  French  peasants 
used  to  be,  perhaps  are  still,  persuaded  that  the  priest  could 
celebrate,  with  certain  special  rites,  a  "  Mass  of  the  Holy 
Spirit,"  of  which  the  efficacy  was  so  miraculous  that  it  never 
met  with  any  opposition  from  the  divine  will;  God  was  forced 
to  grant  whatever  was  asked  of  Him  in  this  form,  however 
rash  and  importunate  might  be  the  petition.  No  idea  of 
impiety  or  irreverence  attached  to  the  rite  in  the  minds  of 
those  who,  in  some  of  the  great  extremities  of  life,  sought  by 
this  singular  means  to  take  the  kingdom  of  heaven  by  storm. 
The  secular  priests  generally  refused  to  say  the  "  Mass  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,"  but  the  monks,  especially  the  Capuchin  friars, 
had  the   reputation  of  yielding  with   less   scruple  to   the  en- 


1/8  OTHER  SHEEP 

treaties  of  the  anxious  and  distressed.  In  the  constraint  thus 
supposed  by  the  Catholic  peasantry  to  be  laid  by  the  priest 
upon  the  deity  we  seem  to  have  an  exact  counterpart  of  the 
power  which,  as  we  saw,  the  ancient  Egyptians  ascribed  to 
their  magicians.  Again,  to  take  another  example,  in  many 
villages  of  Provence  the  priest  is  still  reputed  to  possess  the 
faculty  of  averting  storms.  It  is  not  every  priest  who  enjoys 
this  reputation,  and  in  some  villages,  when  a  change  of  pastors 
takes  place,  the  parishioners  are  eager  to  learn  whether  the 
new  incumbent  has  the  power  (ponder),  as  they  call  it.  At  the 
first  sign  of  a  heavy  storm  they  put  him  to  the  proof  by  in- 
viting him  to  exorcise  the  threatening  clouds ;  and  if  the  result 
answers  to  their  hopes,  the  new  shepherd  is  assured  of  the 
sympathy  and  respect  of  his  flock.  In  some  parishes,  where 
the  reputation  of  the  curate  in  this  respect  stood  higher  than 
that  of  his  rector,  the  relations  between  the  two  have  been  so 
strained  in  consequence  that  the  bishop  has  had  to  translate  the 
rector  to  another  benefice.  Again,  Gascon  peasants  believe 
that  to  revenge  themselves  on  their  enemies  bad  men  will 
sometimes  induce  a  priest  to  say  a  mass  called  the  Mass  of 
Saint  Secaire.  Very  few  priests  know  this  mass,  and  three- 
fourths  of  those  who  do  know  it  would  not  say  it  for  love  or 
money.  None  but  wicked  priests  dare  to  perform  the  grue- 
some ceremony,  and  you  may  be  quite  sure  that  they  will 
have  a  very  heavy  account  to  render  for  it  at  the  last  day.  No 
curate  or  bishop,  not  even  the  Archbishop  of  Auch,  can  pardon 
them;  that  right  belongs  to  the  Pope  of  Rome  alone.  The 
Mass  of  Saint  Secaire  may  be  said  only  in  a  ruined  or  deserted 
Church,  where  owls  mope  and  hoot,  where  bats  flit  in  the 
gloaming,  where  gypsies  lodge  of  nights,  and  where  toads 
squat  under  the  desecrated  altar.  Thither  the  bad  priest  comes 
by  night  with  his  light  o'  love,  and  at  the  first  stroke  of  eleven 
he  begins  to  mumble  the  mass  backwards,  and  ends  just  as 
the  clocks  are  knelling  the  midnight  hour.  His  leman  acts  as 
clerk.  The  host  he  blesses  is  black  and  has  three  points;  he 
consecrates  no  wine,  but  instead  he  drinks  the  water  of  a  well 
into  which  the  body  of  an  unbaptized  infant  has  been  flung. 
He  makes  the  sign  of  the  cross,  but  it  is  on  the  ground  and 


THE  COLLISION  179 

with  his  left  foot.  And  many  other  things  he  does  which  no 
good  Christian  could  look  upon  without  being  struck  blind  and 
deaf  and  dumb  for  the  rest  of  his  life.  But  the  man  for  whom 
the  mass  is  said  withers  away  little  by  little,  and  nobody  can 
say  what  is  the  matter  with  him;  even  the  doctors  can  make 
nothing  of  it.  They  do  not  know  that  he  is  slowly  dying  of 
the  Mass  of  Saint  Secaire.  TJie  Golden  Bough,  Third  Edition, 
Chap.  IV,  pp.  231-233. 

I  must  not  further  plunder  Dr.  Frazer's  great  work, 
but  must  content  myself  by  saying  that  in  that  monu- 
mental thesaurus  of  superstition  and  misbelief,  which 
is  at  the  same  time  the  most  engaging  and  charming 
story  ever  unfolded  by  a  master  hand,  the  reader  will 
find  innumerable  instances  gathered  from  the  British 
Isles,  and  in  our  own  day,  of  a  lingering  faith  in  the 
absurdest  Magic  to  be  found  in  heathendom,  a  faith 
if  not  so  blasphemous  as  that  to  be  seen  openly  practised 
among  the  ignorant  peasants  of  a  Roman  Catholic  coun- 
try, yet  a  faith  entirely  at  variance  with  the  religion  of 
Jesus. 

Most  people  have  smiled  over  that  letter  of  Horace 
Walpole  giving  an  account  of  his  experiences  in  Italy: 
"  Among  other  things  of  great  sanctity  there  is  a  set 
of  gnashing  of  teeth,  the  grinders  very  entire;  a  bit  of 
the  worm  that  never  dies,  preserved  in  spirits;  a  crow^ 
of  St.  Peter's  cock,  very  useful  against  Easter;  the 
crisping  and  curling,  frizzling  and  frouncing  of  Mary 
Magdalen,  which  she  cut  off  on  'growing  devout.  The 
good  man  that  showed  us  all  these  commodities  was  got 
into  such  a  train  of  calling  them  the  blessed  this  and  the 
blessed  that,  that  at  last  he  showed  us  a  bit  of  the  blessed 
fig-tree  that  Christ  cursed."     Such  is  the  foolishness  of 


i8o  OTHER  SHEEP 

a  Latin  Christianity  penetrated  and  suffused  by  the  an- 
cient superstitions  of  Magic;  but  are  there  not  evidences 
in  our  own  Christianity,  in  spite  of  all  the  light  and 
liberalism  flooding  England  from  one  end  of  the  coun- 
try to  the  other,  of  the  same  persisting  superstitions 
and  the  same  inclination  of  the  human  mind  towards 
Magic  ? 

I  ho-pe  that  no  reader  will  regard  the  latter  pages  of 
this  chapter  as  a  digression.  My  object  has  been  to  show 
that  a  Christianity  which  is  priestly  in  character  and 
which  savours  in  the  least  degree  of  Magic,  cannot  look 
for  the  conversion  of  India,  where  an  immemorial  priest- 
hood and  a  thorough  and  explicit  Magic  are  masters  of 
the  situation.^  I  can  easier  believe  that  Brahmanism  will 
eventually  colour  this  priestly  and  sacrificial  Christian- 
ity, carrying  our  ritual  and  our  ceremonial  still  further 
from  the  majestic  simplicity  of  Jesus,  than  that  such  a 
Christianity  will  ever  convert  India  from  her  unrest  and 
her  pessimism  to  the  faith  of  a  little  child  and  the  peace 
that  passes  all  understanding. 

iJt  is  most  important  to  bear  in  mind  that  England's  greatest 
obstacle  to  an  understanding  with  Muhamadan  people  throughout 
the  entire  East  is  the  ceremonialism  of  Christianity,  regarded  by  all 
Mussulmans  as  blasphemous  idolatry. 


WHAT  IT  COSTS 

A  YOUNG  Hindu,  handsomely  dressed  and  of  a  noble 
countenance,  entered  one  day  the  headquarters  of  the 
Salvation  Army  in  Calcutta,  and  drawing  a  Bible  from 
his  cloth  inquired  if  he  might  ask  a  question.  The  Sal- 
vationist to  whom  this  inquiry  was  put,  studying  his 
man,  anticipated  controversy.  To  his  surprise,  however, 
the  young  Brahman  turned  to  the  incident  of  the  man 
who  had  great  possessions,  and  reading  that  story, 
slowly  and  thoughtfully,  emphasized  the  words  Sell 
whatsoever  thou  hast,  repeated  them,  and  at  the  end  of 
his  reading  went  back  to  them  again. 

"  I  want  to  know,"  he  said,  '^  what  is  the  meaning 
of  those  words  —  Sell  whatsoever  thou  hast.  Can  you 
tell  me  what  they  mean  ?  " 

The  Salvationist,  a  little  puzzled  and  perplexed,  re- 
plied that  the  command  referred  to  those  great  posses- 
sions of  the  young  man  which  were  the  chief  obstacle 
between  his  soul  and  God.  "  In  spite  of  a  wish  to  be 
good  and  kind,"  said  he,  "  this  young  man  was  so  taken 
up  with  his  fine  goods  that  he  loved  them  more  than 
God.  Money  w^as  for  him  the  greatest  thing  in  life. 
Until  he  could  bring  himself  to  sell  his  property  and 
give  up  his  money  to  the  poor,  he  could  not  truthfully 
say  that  he  loved  God  with  all  his  heart,  and  with  all 
his  mind,  and  with  all  his  soul." 

The   Brahman  listened  attentively,   closed  his   Bible, 

i8i 


i82  OTHER  SHEEP 

and  said  quietly :  "  I  fear  you  do  not  understand  it. 
I  think  I  know  what  it  means,  but  I  am  not  certain." 

The  Salvationist  asked  him  if  he  desired  to  become  a 
Christian. 

He  replied :  ''  I  am  not  willing  to  sell  all  that  I  pos- 
sess." 

''  You  know  the  text,"  asked  the  Salvationist,  ''  What 
shall  it  pro-fit  a  man  if  he  gain  the  whole  world  and  lose 
his  own  soidf  " 

The  Brahman  looked  at  him  steadily,  and  replied 
— "  Some  day  I  will  sell  all ;  but  not  yet." 

When  he  had  departed  the  Salvationist  turned  to 
Mark's  gospel  and  read  quietly  to  himself  the  story 
of  the  man  who  refused  discipleship :  — 

And  when  He  was  gone  forth  into  the  way,  there 
came  one  running,  and  kneeled  to  Him,  and  asked 
Him,  Good  Master,  what  shall  I  do  that  I  may  inherit 
eternal  life? 

And  Jesus  said  unto  him.  Why  callest  thou  Me 
good?  there  is  none  good  but  One,  that  is,  God. 
Thou  knowest  the  commandments.  Do  not  commit 
adultery,  Do  not  kill.  Do  not  steal.  Do  not  bear  false 
witness,  Defraud  not.  Honour  thy  father  and  mother. 

And  he  answered  and  said  unto  Him,  Master,  all 
these  have  I  observed  from  my  youth. 

Then  Jesus  beholding  him  loved  him,  and  said 
unto  him.  One  thing  thou  lackest:  go  thy  way,  sell 
whatsoever  thou  hast,  and  give  to  the  poor,  and  thou 
shalt  have  treasure  in  heaven:  and  come,  take  up  the 
cross,  and  follow  Me. 

And  he  was  sad  at  that  saying,  and  went  away 
grieved :  for  he  had  great  possessions. 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  183 

It  seemed  to  him  that  he  had  given  a  right  answer, 
he  could  not  see  what  other  answer  was  possible;  and 
yet  this  young  Brahman  had  said,  "  I  fear  you  do  not 
understand  it."  The  story  was  simple  enough.  A 
man  morally  good  but  possessed  by  his  possessions,  had 
come  to  Jesus  with  the  unrest  of  a  soul  starving  for 
the  spiritual  life;  and  he  had  been  told  by  Jesus  that  if 
he  wanted  to  perfect  his  morality  he  must  sell  his  pos- 
sessions, get  rid  of  his  money,  and  give  up  his  life  to 
the  service  of  his  fellow-men.  That  was  the  story. 
Jesus  Himself  had  supplied  the  commentary.  "  It  is 
easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through  the  eye  of  a  needle, 
than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  into  the  Kingdom  of  God." 

But  he  remained  troubled  and  uneasy,  haunted  by 
the  reproachful  thought  that  some  other  answer  might 
have  given  peace  to  the  heart  of  the  inquirer  and  per- 
haps helped  him  to  make  the  great  surrender. 

Some  little  time  after  this  event,  the  young  Brah- 
man appeared  at  one  of  the  meetings  of  the  Salvationists 
in  Calcutta.  There  was  a  great  crowd  in  the  hall,  but 
the  young  and  distinguished-looking  Brahman  w-as 
recognized  by  the  Salvationist  and  they  exchanged 
greetings.  At  the  conclusion  of  the  address,  an  appeal 
was  made  to  those  who  truly  desired  the  liberation  of 
Christ,  to  come  out  in  the  sight  of  all  men  and  kneel  at 
the  bench  of  penitence. 

To  the  relief  and  delight  of  the  Salvationist,  among 
the  very  first  to  rise  was  the  young  Brahman;  but 
scarcely  had  he  moved  a  few  steps  from  his  place  in 
the  crowded  audience,  when  a  storm  seemed  to  break 
out  in  the  meeting.  A  group  of  men,  raising  a  shout 
and  uttering  threats  and  maledictions,  started  up  from 


1^4  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  back,  thrust  their  way  through  the  frightened  peo- 
ple, laid  violent  hands  upon  the  young  Brahman,  and 
bore  him  out  of  the  hall  with  such  wrath  and  indigna- 
tion on  their  faces  as  struck  terror  into  the  hearts  of  the 
low-caste  people. 

For  a  few  weeks  nothing  more  was  heard  of  this 
young  man.  Then  one  day  he  appeared  at  the  head- 
quarters of  the  Salvationists,  and  said,  "  I  want  you  to 
take  me  in." 

He  turned  to  the  man  whose  advice  he  had  first 
sought,  and  said,  "  I  have  begun  to  sell  my  all." 

They  learned  his  story  up  to  that  moment.  It  ap- 
peared that  he  had  come  across  a  Bible  at  his  college, 
and  out  of  curiosity  had  begun  to  read  it.  The  Charac- 
ter of  Jesus,  the  beauty  of  His  teaching,  and  the  no- 
bility of  His  bearing  in  the  hour  of  persecution  and 
death,  had  made  a  profound  impression  upon  him.  Of 
such  a  Master  he  desired  to  be  a  disciple.  But  the 
conditions  of  discipleship  were  hard.  He  was  haunted 
by  the  command,  Sell  whatsoever  thou  hast.  He  con- 
sidered what  it  was  he  should  have  to  sell,  and  the 
sacrifice  appeared  greater  than  he  could  bear.  In  his 
trouble  and  distress,  thinking  perhaps  that  his  knowl- 
edge of  English  or  his  ignorance  of  Christianity  had 
led  him  astray  he  came  to  the  Salvationists  and  asked 
the  meaning  of  those  words,  Sell  zvhatsoever  thou  hast. 
The  answer  had  not  satisfied  him.  He  felt  convinced 
that  his  own  instinctive  interpretation  was  the  true  one. 
He  went  home  to  consider  it.  His  interest  in  Chris- 
tianity was  now  so  great  that  he  discussed  it  with  his 
tutor,  his  fellow-students,  and  even  in  his  home.  He 
belonged   to   the   highest   caste   of  Brahmans,   and   his 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  185 

father,  a  rich  and  powerful  man,  officiated  in  the  temple. 
In  such  a  household  to  discuss  Christianity  was  to  dis- 
cuss Socialism  at  a  King's  table.  Ridicule  was  poured 
upon  the  pretensions  of  this  religion.  No  one  seemed 
to  feel  as  he  felt  the  wonder  and  magic  of  Jesus,  no 
one  even  seemed  to  realize  the  beauty  of  that  perfect 
Character.  The  discussions  that  he  introduced  met  with 
contemptuous  ridicule,  and  were  extinguished  in  dis- 
dainful laughter.  Even  his  tutor,  for  whom  he  enter- 
tained a  great  affection,  and  who  was  a  man  of  learning, 
dismissed  the  reHgion  of  Christianity  as  a  matter  un- 
worthy of  serious  attention. 

Nevertheless,  so  potent  was  the  spell  of  Jesus  on  his 
heart  and  mind,  that  he  determined  at  last  to  surrender 
his  soul  to  Christianity.  For  this  purpose  he  had  at- 
tended the  meeting  of  the  Salvationists.  But  the  sus- 
picions of  his  people  had  been  aroused.  Watched  and 
spied  upon,  he  had  been  followed  to  the  meeting,  and 
at  the  moment  of  his  surrender  he  had  been  dragged 
away  and  carried  to  his  home.  There  the  entreaties  of 
his  father  and  the  tears  of  his  mother,  though  they 
shook  his  whole  nature,  had  failed  to  alter  his  resolution, 
and  for  more  than  a  week  he  had  been  chained  hand  and 
foot,  and  fed  upon  rice  and  water.  At  the  first  oppor- 
tunity of  escape,  he  had  come  to  the  Salvationists  and 
now  he  asked  them  to  take  him  in. 

"  Why  do  you  come  to  us  ?  "  he  was  asked. 

"  Because,"  he  answered,  "  you  appear  to  me  truly 
to  be  following  Christ." 

For  a  fortnight  he  lived  openly  at  the  headquarters, 
refusing  their  offer  to  send  him  to  a  place  of  safety. 
Then,  suddenly  and  without  warning  of  any  kind,  he 


i86  OTHER  SHEEP 

disappeared.  Two  months  passed  without  news  of  him. 
He  had  mysteriously  vanished  out  of  Hfe.  Not  a  sign 
came  to  them  that  he  was  aHve.  Whether  he  had  been 
abducted,  or  of  his  own  will  had  gone  back  to  Hinduism, 
no  one  could  say.  He  had  appeared  anxious  and  un- 
certain during  that  fortnight's  residence,  constantly 
reading  his  Bible,  constantly  seeking  private  com- 
munion with  God  in  prayer.  They  realized  that  the 
change  was  a  great  one  —  from  the  luxury  and  comfort 
of  his  father's  house  to  the  rough  lodging  and  short 
commons  of  their  own  primitive  establishment;  with 
the  large  humanity  which  characterizes  so  many  of 
these  good  and  simple  men,  they  acknowledged  that 
the  actual  life  of  poverty  and  self-sacrifice  is  different 
from  the  ideal  and  is  not  without  its  disappointment 
and  its  disillusion.  Perhaps  the  reality  had  been  too 
much  for  him.  Perhaps  he  had  repented  of  his  im- 
pulsive conversion. 

But  one  day  he  came  back  to  them.  He  told  his  first 
friend  among  these  Salvationists  that  he  had  been 
carried  away  by  his  parents  to  Benares,  that  their  en- 
treaties had  become  threats  and  menaces,  that  his  father 
had  paid  a  large  sum  of  money  to  get  him  rein- 
stated in  caste,  and  that  he  had  been  forced  to  bathe  in 
the  Ganges,  and  that  he  had  been  compelled  to  bow  to 
idols. 

"  I  submitted,"  he  said,  '^  because  it  entailed  no  vio- 
lence on  my  part;  but  when  I  stood  in  the  Ganges,  I 
prayed  —  Lord  Jesus,  wash  me  in  Thy  precious  blood 
and  I  shall  be  whiter  than  snow ;  and  when  I  was  kneel- 
ing in  the  temples,  I  prostrated  my  soul  before  the 
Eternal  Father,  and  said  —  Thou  art  God  alone." 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  187 

He  told  of  how  his  mother  had  implored  him  on  her 
knees  not  to  disgrace  them  by  becoming  a  Christian,  of 
how  the  horror  of  becoming  a  casteless  man  had  been 
forced  upon  him  by  his  father,  and  of  how  his  loved 
tutor  and  his  brothers  had  joined  with  their  father  and 
mother  to  make  him  feel  the  shame  and  scandal  of  de- 
serting Brahmanism  for  the  despised  life  of  a  Christian 
outcast. 

"  Well,"  said  the  Salvationist,  ''  you  have  now 
proved  for  yourself  the  meaning  of  those  words,  Sell 
whatsoever  thou  hast/' 

"  Not  yet,"  he  answered ;  "  but,  I  have  nearly  sold 
all." 

Some  days  later  he  came  to  this  Salvationist  and  said 
to  him — "It  is  over  now.  I  have  sold  all."  He  ap- 
peared to  be  heavy  with  desolation  and  bowed  with 
grief,  but  there  was  nevertheless  in  his  eyes  the  look  of 
a  man  who  has  come  through  darkness  and  is  glad  of  a 
light  that  is  yet  too  strong  for  him. 

He  was  asked  what  final  sacrifice  had  been  made. 

"  Everything  is  given  up  now,"  he  answered.  *'  I 
have  not  only  ceased  to  be  a  Brahman;  I  have  ceased  to 
be  a  human  being.  I  am  not  only  an  outcast,  I  am 
dead.  I  have  neither  father  nor  mother,  brothers  nor 
sisters.  They  made  an  effigy  of  me,  they  set  up  a  pyre, 
and  when  the  effigy  was  burned,  they  buried  the  ashes. 
It  was  not  the  effigy  they  buried ;  it  was  me.  Not  one  of 
my  family  now  regards  me  as  a  living  man.  If  I  meet 
my  mother  in  the  street,  she  will  pass  me  without  a 
word.  If  my  father  were  to  see  me  dying  of  hunger, 
he  would  not  give  me  a  morsel  of  food.  It  would  not 
be  me  my  mother  passed  in  the  street,  it  would  not  be 


i88  OTHER  SHEEP 

me  to  whom  my  father  refused  food;  it  would  be  a 
stranger  and  an  outcast.  I,  their  child,  am  dead;  I, 
their  son,  am  buried.     It  is  the  end." 

In  this  way  he  sold  his  sonship,  his  property,  his 
rank,  his  comfort,  and  became  an  outcast  on  the  face 
of  the  earth.  Now,  to  certain  Indians  this  would  be  no 
hardship,  and  even  to  certain  Brahmans  it  would  not 
be  a  burden  so  very  grievous  to  be  borne ;  but  to  a  Ben- 
gali Brahman,  the  softest  and  least  virile  of  all  Hindus, 
and  to  a  Bengali  Brahman  brought  up  in  an  atmosphere 
of  the  greatest  comfort  and  luxury,  such  a  sacrifice  de- 
manded a  superb  heroism. 

For,  this  rich  youth,  stripped  of  his  social  trappings 
and  exposed  to  the  poverty  of  the  open  w^orld,  went  out 
with  a  single  European  Salvationist  as  an  Apostle  to  as 
low  and  degraded  a  people  as  one  could  find  in  almost 
any  part  of  the  world.  He  went  to  the  Santals, 
aborigines  of  Bengal,  a  people  who  eat  rats  and  snakes, 
and  who  are  looked  upon  even  by  low-caste  Hindus  as 
the  untouchable  offscourings  of  the  human  race.  It 
was  his  own  wish  that  he  should  go  to  these  particular 
people,  and  he  went  with  only  staff,  blanket  and  water- 
pot.  He  slept  in  the  open;  he  accepted  the  rice  which 
these  untouchables  cooked  for  him;  and,  seated  under 
a  village  tree,  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  these  degraded 
savages,  with  a  concertina  in  his  hands,  he  would  sing 
songs  about  a  God  of  Love  and  a  happy  heaven  after 
death,  or  tell  them  in  their  own  language  and  with  all 
the  force  of  their  own  idiom  the  story  of  Jesus. 

Up  till  that  time  the  Salvationists  had  experienced 
the  greatest  difficulty  in  approaching  the  suspicious  and 
ignorant  Santals.     But  now,  perfectly  sure  that  these 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  189 

strange  Europeans  in  native  dress  were  not  "  coolie- 
catching  for  Assam,"  the  villagers  extended  to  them  the 
pleasantest  of  v^elcomes  and  gave  them  a  serious  hear- 
ing. The  result  was  a  work  of  considerable  useful- 
ness among  these  poor  savages;  many  became  faithful 
and  devout  Christians,  and  a  new  idea  of  morality  was 
born  into  their  barbarous  philosophy. 

For  some  years  the  young  Brahman  gave  himself 
body  and  soul  to  this  hard,  difficult,  and  heart-break- 
ing life.  He  was  transformed  from  a  soft  and  troubled 
youth  into  a  vigorous  and  rejoicing  man.  He  loved  his 
work.  He  loved  the  people.  Never  once  did  he  com- 
plain of  his  rough  life,  never  once  did  he  speak  harshly 
of  the  Santals'  stupidity  and  their  deadness  to  spiritual 
ideas.  So  long  as  men  would  listen  and  he  could  tell 
the  story  of  Jesus,  he  was  happy;  and  he  loved  above  all 
things  to  hear  them  pray  to  Our  Father  in  their  own 
language,  with  their  hands  crossed  and  their  faces  raised 
like  little  children  to  the  sky. 

It  was  his  devotion  to  this  work  which  brought  about 
his  death.  In  an  epidemic  of  small-pox  he  was  work- 
ing with  increased  devotion  and  renewed  energy,  when 
he  contracted  the  disease.  He  died  without  a  shadow 
of  doubt,  without  a  shadow  of  regret.  Life  had  been 
as  he  could  have  wished  it  to  be. 

"  You  are  not  sorry,"  he  was  asked,  "  that  you  sold 
all  that  you  had  ?  " 

"  No,"  he  answered,  "  no,  I  am  not  sorry :  I  am  glad. 
But,  I  have  missed  my  mother  and  I  should  have  liked 
to  have  my  tutor  for  my  friend." 

From  this  narrative  the  reader  will  understand  that 
it  is  no  easy  thing   for  Christianity  to   effect  conver- 


I90  OTHER  SHEEP 

sions  among^  the  high-caste  Hindus.  When  the  taunt 
is  levelled,  or  the  confession  fairly  made,  that  Chris- 
tianity can  only  boast  of  conversions  among  the  humble 
and  the  outcast,  it  should  always  be  borne  in  mind  that 
to  effect  conversions  in  other  castes  is  a  matter  of  the 
very  greatest  difficulty;  nay,  a  matter  almost  impossible 
among  the  highest  castes  of  all.  For,  to  convert  a 
Brahman  is  to  take  Portsmouth  and  capture  Berlin,  so 
defended  is  he  by  the  armament  of  custom  and  the  forti- 
fication of  prejudice.  Indeed,  when  a  European  really 
grasps  the  network  of  cunning  device  which  the  piercing 
ingenuity  and  intolerant  arrogance  of  Brahmanism  have 
combined  to  build  for  its  defence  against  Christianity, 
he  will  marvel  that  any  single  man  of  the  higher  castes 
has  ever  escaped  into  freedom. 

At  the  beginning  of  all  these  devices  there  is  the  ques- 
tion of  marriage.  The  Brahman  priest  keeps  the  tight- 
est hand  on  Hymen's  torch,  and  makes  it  the  truncheon 
of  obedience.  He  knows  that  the  first  business  of  every 
Hindu,  after  he  has  begot  a  son  to  sacrifice  at  his  tomb, 
is  to  find  husbands  for  his  inconvenient  and  expensive 
daughters.  Let  a  man  defy  his  priest  ever  so  slightly, 
and  he  will  find  no  one  of  his  own  caste  willing  to  pro- 
vide a  husband  for  his  daughter.  It  is  forbidden  by  the 
priest  that  men  should  cross  the  sea;  hundreds  of  Hindus 
violate  this  command  every  year;  and  perhaps  for  some 
time  afterwards  they  live  in  contemptuous  indifference 
to  the  priest's  displeasure.  But  let  a  daughter  be  born 
to  them,  or  let  them  desire  to  find  a  wife  for  one  of 
their  sons  among  high-caste  families,  and  then,  down  on 
their  marrow-bones  they  must  go  to  Jack  Priest.  Nor 
is  it  enough  that  they  kneel.     Asiatic  ideas  of  humilia- 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  191 

tion  are  not  so  mild  as  European.  The  humble  and  sup- 
plicating cringer  must  consume  in  the  presence  of  his 
master  —  what  think  you  ?  —  the  five  products  of  the 
cow!  Yes;  this  is  unvarnished,  absolute  truth.  Of 
course,  the  priest  is  accommodating.  The  very  rich  may 
get  off  with  a  swinging  fine  and  two  or  three  pilgrim- 
ages :  a  man  of  power  and  influence  may  only  have  to 
touch  with  a  finger,  and  then  carry  the  finger  to  his 
tongue,  the  five  discordant  products  of  the  sacred  cow; 
but  a  man  out  of  whom  the  priest  can  get  nothing  and 
from  whom  he  looks  for  no  protection  or  assistance,  and 
perhaps  whom  he  desires  vindictively  to  humiliate  and 
abase,  must  actually  take  into  his  mouth  and  swallow 
the  milk,  the  saliva,  the  tears,  the  urine,  and  the  excre- 
ment of  the  cow. 

To  break  caste  in  India  is  to  break  a  priest's  rule,  and 
the  consequences  of  such  a  violation  are  but  faintly 
imaged  to  our  mind  in  the  consequences  which  would 
befall  a  man  in  England  who  cheated  at  cards,  forged 
cheques,  purloined  jewellery,  and  blackmailed  his 
friends.  We  can  better  imagine  the  condition  of  things 
in  India  by  likening  it  to  a  supposititious  state  of  affairs 
here,  in  which  a  man  w^ho  ate  jelly  with  a  spoon  would 
next  day  find  himself  the  shivering  victim  of  an  archi- 
diaconal  visitation,  or  a  man  who  wore  a  white  tie  with 
a  dinner  jacket  find  himself  cast  upon  the  Thames  Em- 
bankment by  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  and  chivvied 
out  of  Rowton  House  and  Salvation  Army  Shelter  by 
the  ceaseless  activity  of  the  Bishop  of  London.  For  the 
offences  which  the  priest  punishes  with  outlawry  or 
loathsome  ceremonies  of  abominable  degradation,  are 
not  crimes  against  society  and  not  defiance  of  Almighty 


192  OTHER  SHEEP 

God,  but  are  things  right  and  proper  to  every  free-born 
man,  and  sinful  only  in  this,  that  they  are  forbidden  by 
the  etiquette  of  Brahmanism. 

But  that  etiquette  is  designed  with  a  cunning  and  far- 
reaching  purpose.  It  is  to  keep  Hinduism  uninfluenced 
by  any  religion,  philosophy,  or  science  in  the  world; 
it  is  to  keep  the  Hindu  faithful  to  Brahmanism;  and  it 
is  to  preserve  the  power  of  the  Brahman. 

You  may  be  the  greatest  aristocrat  in  Europe,  or  the 
most  holy  saint  in  the  world,  but  the  faithful  Hindu, 
however  disgusting  his  habits  and  unprincipled  his  con- 
duct, will  go  wash  himself,  spiritually  disinfect  himself, 
after  shaking  your  hand.  For  there  is  flattery  in  the 
iron  law  of  Brahmanical  isolation.  The  Hindu  is  en- 
couraged to  regard  himself  as  the  first  flower  of  the  hu- 
man race;  he  is  taught  from  his  youth  to  look  upon  the 
white  man  with  contempt  and  aversion;  he  is  bred  in 
the  highest  conceit  ever  known  in  history;  and  he  is 
made  to  feel  that  the  prison  which  shyts  him  in  and 
makes  him  a  miserable  slave  is  in  truth  a  proud  palace 
of  superiority  which  protects  him  from  the  contagion  of 
inferior  people. 

The  fundamental  and  axiomatic  doctrine  of  reincarna- 
tion, with  all  its  subsidiary  ceremonials  of  death,  is  a 
most  powerful  guard  against  invasion,  a  most  powerful 
preventive  against  desertion.  A  superstitious  man 
taught  to  think  that  he  m.ay  be  born  again,  endlessly, 
endlessly,  and  in  tvery  condition  of  misery  and  degrada- 
tion, and  who  has  inherited  with  the  blood  of  his  parents 
the  fixed  belief  that  the  Brahmans  can  control  the  pow- 
ers of  the  universe,  will  think  twice,  nay,  will  think  a 
thousand  times,  before  he  takes  such  a  step  as  will  incur 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  193 

even  the  annoyance  of  those  powerful  twice-born  men, 
much  more  such  a  step  as  will  flout  them  and  bring  all 
the  artillery  of  their  magic  against  his  soul. 

In  no  country  in  the  world  is  custom  —  Dastur  —  so 
omnipotent  as  it  is  in  India.  My  servant  going  with  me 
on  my  shopping  excursions  always  got  a  commission  at 
every  native  shop  we  entered.  He  had  not  taken  me 
there,  and  he  neither  selected  the  articles  I  purchased 
nor  helped  to  make  my  wants  known  to  the  shopkeeper; 
he  was  there  merely  to  carry  my  parcels  and  to  direct  my 
cab-driver;  but  he  always  got  bakshish,  or  as  such  com- 
missions are  significantly  called,  dasturi.  "  It  is  the 
custom,"  he  told  me.  Never  mind  how  unreasonable 
or  preposterous  a  thing  may  be,  so  long  as  it  is  sanc- 
tioned by  Dastur,  it  is  held  to  be  the  most  natural  thing 
in  the  world. 

Therefore,  with  a  Brahmanical  priesthood  governing 
every  department  of  social  life,  arbiter  of  marriage  and 
lord  of  death,  and  with  a  people  absolutely  subservient 
to  the  time-honoured  laws  of  Custom,  how  can  we  won- 
der that  the  classes  most  amenable  to  priestly  discipline 
because  they  are  the  principal  sharers  in  the  advantages 
of  that  tyranny  —  a  solid  phalanx  of  superstition  and 
conservatism  —  how  can  we  wonder  that  they  should 
withstand  the  warring  and  contending  and  competing 
missionaries  of  a  dismembered  Christendom?  Is  it  not 
a  matter  for  amazement  that  any  conversions  at  all 
should  occur  among  these  guarded,  governed,  and  dis- 
dainful millions? 

That  there  is  a  real  rivalry  between  the  various  mis- 
sionaries of  Christianity  the  following  brief,  almost 
amusing,  almost  gruesome,  and  withal  sorrowful  story, 


194  OTHER  SHEEP 

told  to  me  by  a  doctor  in  one  of  the  Salvation  Army  hos- 
pitals, pretty  faithfully  attests.  The  doctor  in  question, 
a  young  man  bristling  with  energy,  quick  in  action,  reso- 
lute in  purpose,  and  most  engaging  with  his  mixture  of 
profound  religiousness  and  joyful  humour  —  was  called 
to  the  deathbed  of  a  young  Native  converted  to  Chris- 
tianity by  the  Salvation  Army.  This  poor  fellow's 
father  had  been  converted  by  the  Roman  Catholic  Mis- 
sion and  there  was  a  certain  amount  of  strife  between 
them. 

''  When  I  arrived,"  said  the  doctor,  "  I  found  one  of 
our  Salvationists,  an  excellent  good  man,  soothing  the 
boy's  last  minutes  with  kind  words  and  gentle  assur- 
ances of  comfort.  He  had  been  sent  for  by  the  mother. 
Some  time  after  my  arrival,  into  the  house  came  a  Ro- 
man Catholic  priest,  post  haste.  We  were  amazed.  He 
took  no  notice  of  us,  said  no  word  to  the  boy,  now  al- 
most unconscious,  but  began  with  a  deal  of  puffing  and 
panting  to  get  into  his  sacred  robes.  While  he  did  this, 
the  Salvationist  knelt  down  and  prayed.  The  priest  told 
him  to  stop.  He  went  on.  The  priest  came  to  the  bed- 
side and  began  the  service  of  Extreme  Unction.  This 
riled  me.  Then  he  ceased  and  said  to  the  Salvationist, 
'  Stop  that  row ! '  But  our  fellow  went  on  —  fine !  fine ! 
Oh,  he  was  a  master  at  praying.  But  think!  There 
was  I,  holding  the  boy's  pulse,  of  course  he  was  quite 
unconscious  then,  with  a  Salvationist  praying  hard  at 
my  side  of  the  bed,  and  a  Roman  Catholic  priest  gab- 
bling away  as  fast  as  he  could  go,  on  the  other;  and 
over  us  all  —  Death!  Death!  —  the  great  Mystery!  I 
felt  just  like  a  referee,  with  my  watch  in  my  hand,  wait- 
ing for  the  end  of  a  race!     I  was  mad  as  fire  with  the 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  195 

priest,  and  I  was  half  afraid  the  Salvationist  might  stop 
praying  and  leave  the  Catholic  last  on  the  field  —  to 
boast  afterwards  that  the  boy  had  died  a  faithful  Ro- 
man. So  I  kept  on  whispering  to  our  officer  to  go  on, 
to  keep  it  up,  all  the  time  feeling  the  pulse  and  keeping 
an  eye  on  the  perspiring  priest.  Prayer  was  of  no  avail, 
but  I  wanted  our  man  to  be  there,  and  I  bade  him  go  on. 
And  all  the  time,  the  priest  was  rattling  away  and  the 
poor  pulse  was  flickering  into  everlasting  quiet.  Just 
before  the  priest  had  come  to  the  point  of  his  ceremony, 
the  pulse  stopped,  and  I  said,  '  It's  over  —  God  bless 
him.'  I  tell  you,  if  the  priest  had  started  on  his  busi- 
ness of  touching  the  body  and  all  the  rest  of  it,  then  and 
there  I  should  have  knocked  him  down.  My  blood  was 
up.  The  whole  thing  fairly  sickened  me.  Fancy,  the 
interference,  the  insolence,  the  scandalous  humbug  of 
it!  But  can't  you  see  the  scene?  —  the  robed  priest  on 
one  side,  the  praying  Salvationist  on  the  other,  and  I, 
holding  the  pulse  and  the  watch,  and  telling  our  man  to 
keep  on  praying.  It  wasn't  a  race  for  a  man's  soul. 
But  it  was  a  race  for  decency  and  justice.  I  think  if 
the  dying  boy  had  been  conscious  enough  to  know  what 
was  going  on,  I  should  have  taken  that  priest  by  the 
scruff  of  his  neck,  and — .  But  it  was  a  scene,  I  tell 
you.     Lord,  Lord,  what  a  world  it  is." 

Not  once  or  twice,  and  not  here  and  there,  but  many 
times  and  all  over  India,  I  heard  from  men  outside  the 
arena  of  religious  activity,  that  the  conflict  between  vari- 
ous Missions  is  fatal  to  the  progress  of  a  true  and  funda- 
mental Christianity.  One  Mission  comes  into  a  dis- 
trict, sets  up  its  buildings,  and  employs  a  certain  num- 
ber of  Indians:  then  comes  another  Mission,  goes  one 


196  OTHER  SHEEP 

better  in  the  way  of  buildings,  and  offers  a  more  liberal 
wage  —  actually  taking  away  the  servants  of  its  rivals. 
I  know  myself  painful  instances  of  such  a  state  of 
things.  And  there  is  one  small  town,  almost  a  village, 
where  you  may  see  no  less  than  three  large  Mission  hos- 
pitals !  Is  it  a  matter  of  wonder  that  the  Indians  laugh 
among  themselves,  compare  wages,  go  where  they  get 
most,  and  offer  themselves  to  any  form  of  religious 
ceremonial,  baptism  or  anything  else,  so  long  as  they 
get  good  wages  and  medicine  for  nothing? 

One  most  deplorable  aspect  of  this  unseemly  rivalry 
is  the  fact  that  a  united  Christendom,  even  with  a  gos- 
pel of  pessimism,  might  have  converted  long  ago  the 
whole  of  the  depressed  classes.  A  Governor  of  a  great 
province  said  to  me,  "  I  am  absolutely  certain  that  if  the 
Missions  had  been  united,  and  all  the  money  poured 
into  India  had  been  from  the  first  spent  on  a  con- 
centrated errand  to  the  outcast  peoples,  Christianity 
would  now  be  able  to  claim  70,000,000  Native  Chris- 
tians. These  people,  you  see,  have  everything  to  gain 
and  nothing  to  lose,  by  becoming  Christians.  They  are 
outcasts,  and  Christianity  would  make  them  members  of 
the  Sahib's  caste.  They  are  the  slaves  of  the  castes 
above  them;  and  Christianity  would  set  them  free.  I 
cannot  imagine  anything  easier  for  missionary  enter- 
prise than  the  conversion  of  India's  depressed  classes. 
And,  mark  you,  a  democracy  of  70,000,000  Christians 
would  have  a  most  astonishing  effect  upon  the  higher 
castes.  But  —  dissension,  rivalry,  quarrels!  Every- 
where a  waste  of  money  and  a  waste  of  effort!  It  is 
pitiful.  However,  they  are  doing  good  work  here  and 
there,  and  I  suppose  a  united  Christianity  in  Europe, 


WHAT  IT  COSTS  197 

America,  or  Asia,  is  as  wild  a  dream  as  Plato's  Repub- 
lic and  More's  Utopia." 

But  in  spite  of  the  Brahman's  jealous  and  angry 
hatred  of  Christianity,  in  spite  of  his  new-born  zeal  for 
Hinduism,  and  in  spite  of  the  lamentable  divisions 
among  the  Christians,  conversions  of  a  marvellous  char- 
acter do  occur,  and  are  occurring  every  day,  where  Chris- 
tianity is  faithfully  and  earnestly  presented  as  a  libera- 
tion from  misery  and  a  way  of  peace.  The  story  that 
follows,  which  seems  to  me  perhaps  as  remarkable  a 
narrative  as  one  can  find  in  all  our  modern  literature  of 
religious  experience,  testifies  to  the  unique  power  of 
Christianity,  to  the  miraculous  nature  of  conversion, 
and  to  the  supreme  need  of  Christianity's  cleansing  mo- 
rality in  a  country  more  enfeebled  by  appalling  vices 
than  by  the  tyranny  of  its  priests. 


DE  PROFUNDIS 

Although  the  scene  of  this  story  is  laid  in  Ceylon, 
the  reader  may  rest  assured  that  in  every  way  it  is 
symptomatic  of  existence  in  India,  and  also  character- 
istic of  religious  experience  in  India  wherever  the  appeal 
of  Christianity  for  a  cleansed  heart  is  brought  faithfully 
home. 

The  man  of  whom  I  write  is  now  forty-nine  years  of 
age.  He  is  remarkable  in  appearance  for  a  perfect  tran- 
quillity of  expression  and  a  sweet  gravity  of  demeanour 
such  as  one  associates  with  the  favourite  disciple.  His 
dark  hair  is  combed  back  from  the  forehead  and  curls 
outward  from  the  nape  of  the  neck;  his  large  grave  dark- 
coloured  eyes  are  shadowed  by  the  eave  of  calm  and 
noble  brows;  the  nose  is  aquiline  and  finely  chiselled  at 
the  nostrils;  the  gentle  lips  are  all  but  hidden  by  mous- 
tache and  beard  of  iron  grey;  he  is  dark-skinned  with 
the  cloudy  opaqueness  of  a  true  Tamil. 

One  is  struck  by  the  depth  of  gravity  in  the  beautiful 
calm  eyes,  by  the  sad  sweetness  of  the  gentle  mouth, 
and  by  the  tone  of  the  quiet  voice,  which  is  almost  husky 
in  its  lowness  and  its  modesty.  He  has  all  the  repose 
and  serenity  of  the  Buddha  with  the  meditation  and 
spiritual  humanity  of  St.  John.  In  his  presence  one  is 
conscious  of  a  rebuke,  a  sweet  and  smiling  rebuke,  to 
all  hurry,  noise,  struggle,  and  glibness.  The  atmos- 
phere of  the  man  is  the  solemn  calm  of  a  forest  and  the 

198 


DE  PROFUNDIS  199 

steadfast  quiet  of  a  lake.  He  seems  to  breathe  the 
very  peace  of  God. 

It  was  the  notable  and  arresting  appearance  of  this 
man  which  first  attracted  me,  and  led  me  to  seek  an 
introduction  to  him  from  Fakir  Singh.  I  had  heard  of 
his  extraordinary  success  as  a  missionary,  his  almost 
unique  power  among  Indians ;  but  it  was  the  man's  face 
that  interested  my  attention.  I  anticipated  a  life-story 
of  spiritual  grace  and  religious  refinement;  I  never 
dreamed  that  such  a  man  could  have  lived  in  depravity, 
could  have  descended  to  the  depths  of  the  abyss.  I 
can  now  more  easily  think  of  St.  John  as  a  Satyr  or  the 
Baptist  as  a  Sybarite,  than  visualize  this  gentle  and  com- 
posed saint  as  the  man  he  was  four-and-twenty  years 
ago. 

He  was  born  in  Colombo  of  well-to-do  Tamil  par- 
ents who  were  converted  to  Christianity  before  his  birth 
by  the  Church  Missionary  Society.  He  was  taught  as 
a  child  the  new  religion  of  his  father  and  mother,  and 
grew  into  boyhood  with  much  the  same  knowledge  of 
Christianity  as  one  finds  in  the  ordinary  English  child 
of  church-going  or  chapel-going  parents. 

He  was  sent  to  a  good  school  in  Colombo,  and  soon 
showed  himself  a  boy  of  unusual  ability.  But  he  had 
not  been  long  at  this  school  before  he  became  the  vic- 
tim of  vice.  He  knew  it  to  be  wTong,  he  felt  himself 
shameful,  he  even  convinced  himself  that  the  punish- 
ment of  such  an  abomination  was  the  unquenchable  fire 
of  an  everlasting  hell,  but  he  could  not  break  free  from 
it.  He  used  to  pray  so  hard  for  deliverance  from  this 
sin  when  he  was  at  church  that  his  father  and  mother 
thought  him  more  than  usually  devout,  and  praised  him 


200  OTHER  SHEEP 

for  his  devotion.  Stung  by  the  mockery  of  this  praise, 
and  conscious  of  hypocrisy,  he  fought  with  all  his 
strength  to  conquer  the  evil  propensity  that  was  slaying 
his  soul.  For  a  few  weeks  he  could  stand  against  the 
terrible  power  tyrannizing  his  will,  and  then,  like  a  man 
under  hypnotic  influence  or  a  slave  hasting  to  do  his 
master's  bidding,  he  fell  again,  and  was  plunged  into  a 
darkness  that  eclipsed  his  soul. 

From  school  he  went  to  a  college  at  Kandy.  He 
there  lodged  at  a  boarding-house,  and  his  handsome  ap- 
pearance and  charming  manners  made  him  a  favourite 
with  women  staying  in  the  same  house.  It  was  his  first 
experience  of  the  world,  his  first  acquaintance  with 
women's  society.  Unfortunately  for  his  peace  of  mind, 
these  women  were  of  a  second-rate  and  unhealthy  char- 
acter. The  conversation  of  the  shabby  boarding-house 
degraded  him  and  made  him  wretched. 

He  would  pass  whole  nights  upon  his  knees,  praying 
to  God,  agonizing  with  his  soul,  clamouring  for  deliv- 
erance. "  I  used  to  feel,"  he  told  me,  in  his  low  and 
muffled  voice,  "  as  if  I  were  wrestling  with  another 
being.  It  was  as  if  something  not  myself  had  my  soul 
in  its  grip." 

When  he  returned  to  his  home  he  became  on  friendly 
terms  with  the  English  pastor  of  his  parents'  church, 
and  even  acted  as  an  assistant  in  the  church  services. 
At  last,  so  wretched  was  he,  and  so  attracted  by  the 
goodness  of  his  new  friend,  that  he  determined  to  speak 
to  him. 

"  I  did  not  tell  him,"  he  said,  "  what  I  have  told  you, 
but  I  confessed  to  him  that  I  was  troubled  with  terri- 
ble thoughts.     He  was  a  man  of  extraordinary  holiness. 


DE  PROFUNDIS  201 

He  heard  me  patiently  and  sympathetically,  even  affec- 
tionately. '  Pray/  he  said,  '  pray,  and  read  the  Bible. 
You  must  pray;  there  is  nothing  else.''' 

But  this  poor  youth  had  prayed  as  perhaps  the  other 
had  never  prayed  in  his  whole  life.  He  had  shut  him- 
self in  his  room  and  through  all  the  dragging  hours  of 
the  long  night  had  cried  to  God  out  of  the  agony  and 
tragedy  of  his  soul's  need  for  mercy  and  for  help.  He 
had  prayed  with  all  the  passion  of  his  temperament  and 
with  all  the  force  of  his  moral  being.  He  had  cried  to 
God,  cried  with  his  soul,  night  after  night,  night  after 
night.  He  had  lifted  to  heaven  a  face  wet  with  tears 
and  streaked  with  the  striving  of  his  spirit.  Pray! 
Had  he  not  prayed  again  and  again?  Had  he  not  hum- 
bled and  abased  himself,  gone  down  into  the  dust  and 
ashes  of  humiliation,  and  supplicated,  implored,  en- 
treated, and  sobbed  his  soul  out?     Many  times. 

There  was  no  one  to  help  him.  He  became  dejected, 
even  morose.  His  parents,  noticing  the  change  in  him, 
suggested  that  he  should  go  and  help  his  brother  in  a 
business  up  the  country.  He  welcomed  the  prospect  of 
change,  and  left  Colombo  as  soon  as  arrangements  were 
completed. 

The  business  to  which  he  went  —  this  man  with  the 
face  of  a  saint  —  was  a  glorified  grog-shop.  It  is  true 
that  the  brother  described  himself  as  a  wine  merchant 
and  could  boast  of  a  "  wholesale  department "  in  his 
trade,  but  the  place  was  a  drinking-saloon  and  the  com- 
pany that  frequented  it  of  a  wild  and  dissolute  charac- 
ter. The  house  was  situated  on  a  large  tea-estate,  and 
the  landlord  was  the  owner  of  one  plantation,  and  the 
manager  of  many  others  —  a  roaring  Irishman,  always 


202  OTHER  SHEEP 

drunk  and  abandoned  to  the  mad  excesses  and  helter- 
skelter  escapades  which  made  Jack  Mytton  a  hero  of 
his  time.  This  man  and  many  another  planter  visited 
the  grog-shop  every  day  and  few  ever  quitted  it  till 
they  were  badly  drunk.  The  first  horror  of  the  youth 
from  Colombo  soon  wore  off  in  the  gaiety  and  hilarity 
of  his  new  atmosphere;  he  did  not  give  himself  to  drink 
and  he  did  not  take  to  the  prevalent  gambling;  but  he 
let  himself  go  with  the  tide  of  existence  in  this  wild 
place,  continued  his  evil  courses,  and  gave  up  the  strug- 
gle for  freedom  and  purity. 

At  the  death  of  his  brother,  he  took  possession  of  the 
business  and  set  himself  to  make  money.  He  was  sober, 
industrious,  and  dishonest.  He  learned  to  adulterate 
the  liquor  he  sold,  carefully  removing  the  capsules  of 
bottles  for  this  purpose,  and  so  carefully  replacing  them 
that  it  was  impossible  to  detect  the  transaction.  He 
wasted  no  money  on  dissolute  excesses  or  reasonable 
amusements,  kept  himself  clear  of  the  women  in  the 
district,  and  never  imperilled  his  savings  in  speculation 
or  gambling.  But  he  had  one  typical  and  foolish  ex- 
travagance. He  loved  jewels.  It  was  with  him  some- 
thing of  a  passion  to  cover  himself  with  chains,  and 
gold,  and  glittering  stones.  To  this  end  he  adulterated 
drink,  hoarded  money,  and  kept  himself  aloof  from 
the  dissolute  racket  of  the  place.  All  the  time,  he  felt 
that  the  liquor  trade  was  a  bad  one,  and  sometimes  he 
would  make  an  effort  to  conquer  his  fatal  sin;  but,  on 
the  whole,  he  was  a  bad  man  who  takes  life  as  he  finds 
it  and  in  a  hobby  which  gratifies  his  sensuous  nature 
loses  the  sense  of  responsibility  and   forgets  his  soul. 


DE  PROFUNDIS  203 

So  long  as  he  could  buy  jewellery  he  was  content  to  go 
on  with  his  life. 

He  was  reckoned  by  the  planters  a  good  man  but 
something  too  effeminate  and  rather  a  humbug.  If  he 
ventured  to  reprove  them  for  drinking  too  much  they 
used  to  laugh  contemptuously  and  say  to  him,  *'  Oh,  you 
can't  preach ;  you're  in  the  business !  "  They  liked  to 
turn  his  saloon  into  a  bear-garden.  They  would  call 
Tamils  and  Singhalese  into  the  saloon  and  tell  them  to 
do  some  absurd  or  shameful  thing;  a  refusal  meant  a 
blow.  The  roaring  Irishman  would  very  often  order 
the  grog-shop  keeper  to  use  foul  and  blasphemous  lan- 
guage; a  refusal  meant  a  row.  On  one  occasion  land- 
lord and  tenant  had  a  fight,  a  long  and  horrible  fight; 
but  a  week  after  that  event'  the  landlord  came  with  a 
company  of  his  friends,  apologized  to  the  publican  and 
presented  him  with  a  gold  pencil-case.  The  kicked  and 
beaten  Tamils  would  always  be  rewarded  after  maltreat- 
ment by  their  bullies,  who  were  only  cowardly  and 
brutal  in  drink.  They  w^ere  generous  men  enough  on  all 
occasions,  and  in  their  sober  moments,  straightforward, 
honest,  and  hard-working — men  who  would  have 
scorned  to  ill-use  a  Native.  But  drink  turned  them  into 
madmen,  and  in  drink  they  very  often  "  made  hay  "  of 
the  grog-shop. 

The  wild  landlord  would  sometimes  send  for  the  pub- 
lican and  receive  him  in  his  bedroom.  "  He  used  to  lie 
in  his  bed,"  I  was  told,  "  smoking  and  drinking,  while 
small  pigs,  for  which  he  had  sent,  were  being  chased, 
squeaking  and  squealing  round  the  room  by  his  dogs; 
he  would  sit  up  against  the  pillows,  watching  this  hunt  — 


204  OTHER  SHEEP 

shouting  with  laughter,  encouraging  the  dogs,  and  mak- 
ing the  whole  house  ring  with  his  yells.  And  in  the 
midst  of  all  this  he  would  tell  me  how  sorry  he  was  for 
such-and-such  an  escapade  in  my  saloon,  assure  me  that 
he  meant  to  stop  all  such  nonsense  in  future,  swear  that 
drink  was  a  curse,  and  end  up  by  imploring  me  to  finish 
a  bottle  of  whisky  with  him." 

Many  years  afterwards,  when  the  saloon-keeper  was 
a  captain  in  the  Salvation  Army,  these  two  men  en- 
countered in  the  rest-house  of  a  village  where  the  Army 
was  conducting  a  mission.  The  Salvationist  endeav- 
oured to  turn  the  heart  of  the  Irishman  but  all  in  vain; 
then  he  asked  him  for  a  subscription.  "  WilHngly," 
said  the  planter,  and  dipping  pen  in  ink  he  wrote  the  fol- 
lowing chit:    "  Please  give  Captain the  sum  of  one 

rupee  to  send  all  the  people  in  this  village  to  hell." 

But  this  was  after  the  miracle  had  happened. 

The  man  of  my  story  married  while  he  was  yet  a  pub- 
lican.  A  child  was  born  to  him  and  he  began  to  ex- 
perience the  pleasures  of  domestic  life.  He  was  pros- 
perous ;  he  had  many  friends ;  and  he  was  devoted  to  his 
wife.  But  presently  he  felt  the  ancient  stirrings  and 
unrest  of  his  master  vice,  and  soon  again  he  found  him- 
self in  conflict  for  his  soul.  His  horror  and  fear  at  this 
return  of  a  demon  he  had  hoped  was  slain,  this  resurrec- 
tion of  a  spectre  he  had  dreamed  was  gone  for  ever  out 
of  his  life,  filled  him  with  misery  and  despair.  He  went 
to  church ;  he  read  his  Bible ;  he  prayed ;  he  fought  man- 
fully against  disaster.  "  It  was  as  though  I  were  being 
pushed  into  sin,"  he  said  to  me. 

One  day  when  he  was  in  Colombo  he  stopped  before 
a  bookshop  window,  and  seeing  a  volume  that  he  thought 


DE  PROFUNDIS  205 

might  help  him  in  his  conflict,  he  went  in  to  buy  it. 
There  were  two  people  in  the  shop  —  the  man  in  charge, 
wearing  a  uniform,  and  a  poor  broken-down  drunkard. 
The  man  in  the  uniform  was  talking  to  the  drunkard 
and  endeavouring  to  make  him  realize  the  need  of  God 
in  his  struggle  against  drink.  The  publican,  struck  by 
this  man's  words,  and  now  realizing  that  the  shop  be- 
longed to  the  Salvation  Army,  went  to  some  bookshelves 
and  made  pretence  of  looking  for  a  volume,  while  he 
listened  to  every  word  that  was  being  said. 

"  There  was  something  in  the  tone  of  that  man's 
voice,"  he  told  me,  "  which  held  me  like  a  spell.  It  was 
so  full  of  assurance.  It  was  as  though  he  knew  by  his 
own  experience  that  what  he  said  was  true.  And  he 
made  goodness  seem  so  happy.  I  began  to  feel  that 
there  was  hope  for  me.  I  remember  that  I  felt  sur- 
prised by  the  drunkard's  want  of  response.  It  seemed 
so  clear.     It  seemed  so  true.     It  sounded  so  good." 

But  two  years  after  that  incident  he  was  still  in  the 
midst  of  conflict,  a  man  desperate  with  uncontrollable 
vice  and  sunken  in  despair. 

He  was  walking  one  day  with  his  mother  in  the  streets 
of  Colombo  when  they  came  upon  an  open-air  meeting 
of  the  Salvationists.  They  both  stopped  and  listened. 
The  mother  was  greatly  struck  by  the  earnestness  of  the 
speakers,  and  as  they  walked  away  she  spoke  about  it. 
Her  son,  who  w^as  a  secret  smoker  —  his  mother  and 
father  having  a  great  aversion  from  tobacco  —  took  his 
cigars  from  his  pocket  and  without  letting  his  mother 
see,  dropped  them  on  the  road.  He  had  the  feeling  that 
he  must  give  up  smoking.  He  also  had  the  feeling  that 
he  would  be  able  to  give  up  his  vice. 


2o6  OTHER  SHEEP 

But  the  strife  continued,  and  though  he  prayed  for 
strength,  no  strength  came  to  him.  He  was  being  driven 
straight  to  madness  and  suicide  by  an  impulse  of  his 
being  of  which  his  whole  nature  disapproved  and  yet 
against  which  his  will  was  powerless  to  resist. 

It  chanced  one  year,  when  he  went  to  renew  the  li- 
cence of  his  premises,  that  he  stayed  with  his  brother- 
in-law  in  a  small  town  where  the  Salvationists  were  that 
night  holding  a  special  meeting.  He  suggested  that  they 
should  attend  this  meeting  and  see  what  the  business  of 
Salvation  and  Conversion  really  meant.  His  brother- 
in-law  fell  in  with  the  suggestion  and  they  went  to- 
gether. 

Many  men,  public  characters  for  sin  and  crime,  gave 
their  testimonies  at  this  meeting  to  the  saving  power  of 
conversion  and  the  joy  and  peace  and  happiness  of  the 
new  birth.  One  of  the  speakers  was  a  converted  Bud- 
dhist who  had  been  convicted  of  forgery.  This  man 
spoke  very  quietly,  and,  without  any  strain  after  effect, 
telling  how  he  had  been  led  by  sin  step  after  step 
towards  crime,  and  how  all  his  efforts  to  fight  against 
temptation  had  failed.  The  unhappy  publican  was  pro- 
foundly moved  by  this  story.  The  Buddhist  spoke  of 
the  strength  that  came  to  him  when,  realizing  at  last  that 
Christ's  love  had  saved  him,  he  bowed  at  the  bench  of 
penitence  and  yielded  up  all  his  efforts  in  overflowing 
gratitude  to  his  Saviour. 

"  I  felt  that  what  he  said  was  true.  I  felt  that  I  had 
been  struggling  in  my  own  strength.  And  I  felt  that 
it  needed  one  great  moment  in  my  life,  one  moment, 
to  change  me  from  a  beaten  and  despairing  man  into  a 


DE  PROFUNDIS  207 

soul  at  peace  with  God  and  cleansed  from  sin.  It  was 
like  a  light  in  my  soul.  It  was  a  revelation.  At  last,  it 
was  a  voice  from  heaven.  But  how  to  reach  that  mo- 
ment! Oh,  I  shrank  from  it!  By  nature  I  am  timid 
and  nervous;  and  in  those  days  I  was  weak  with  self- 
consciousness  and  feeble  with  diffidence ;  I  could  not  bear 
to  be  the  central  figure  in  any  scene;  I  always  escaped 
from  any  gathering  in  which  I  might  be  called  upon  to 
make  a  speech,  or  in  which  I  might  in  any  way  have  to 
take  a  prominent  part.  But  I  felt  that  my  conversion 
turned  upon  one  great  moment,  one  decisive  and  terrible 
ordeal,  and  I  longed  for  the  power  to  rise  up  then  and 
there  and  throw  myself  down  at  the  penitent  bench.  I 
suppose  something  of  this  deep  emotion  must  have 
shown  in  my  face,  for  one  of  the  Salvationists,  a  woman, 
came  to  me  and  asked  me  if  I  would  not  confess  my  need 
of  God's  mercy.  I  half  rose  from  my  seat,  but  pretend- 
ing that  I  had  only  risen  because  a  woman  was  speak- 
ing to  me,  I  sat  down  again,  trembling  and  afraid.  But 
just  as  in  former  times  I  had  felt  that  pushing  towards 
sin,  so  I  felt  now  a  pushing  towards  the  penitent-form. 
So  strong  was  this  impulse  that  in  spite  of  my  failure  I 
rose  again.  This  time  my  brother-in-law,  thinking  that 
I  wanted  to  go  home,  rose  also,  and  I  felt  ashamed,  and 
said  nothing  of  my  feelings,  but  walked  out  of  the  hall. 
However  the  hour  was  at  hand.  I  kept  saying  to  my- 
self, "  If  I  die  to-night!  and  even  if  I  live,  only  this 
slavery !  "  The  horror  of  dying  as  I  was,  the  fear  of 
living  as  I  was,  mastered  my  feeble  will  and  cowardly 
purpose.  Without  a  word  to  my  companion,  I  turned 
suddenly  about,  ran  back  to  the  hall,  and  making  my 


2o8  OTHER  SHEEP 

way  to  the  front  —  I  was  like  a  man  in  a  dream  —  flung 
myself  down  at  the  penitent- form  and  cried  aloud  for  the 
mercy  of  God." 

As  he  knelt  there,  shaken  by  a  wild  emotion  and 
almost  beside  himself  with  religious  passion,  a  woman- 
Salvationist  came  to  him,  knelt  at  his  side,  and  with  a 
hand  on  his  shoulder,  said  in  a  calm  and  quieting  voice 
— "  What  are  you  praying  for,  brother  ?  " 

He  answered,  "  For  Salvation." 

"Why  do  you  pray  to  God?"  she  asked. 

"Because  I  feel  God  can  save  me." 

"Why?" 

"I  feel  it." 

"  Have  you  not  heard  that  Jesus  died  for  sinners  ?  " 

"  Yes." 

"  For  whom  ?  " 

"For  the  whole  world." 

"Are  you  not  included  in  it?" 

"  Yes." 

"Do  you  believe  that?" 

"  Yes." 

"Do  you  believe  it?" 

"  Yes." 

"When  do  you  believe  it?" 

"  Now." 

"When?" 

"  Now." 

As  he  said  that  word  for  the  second  time,  he  was  con- 
scious of  a  light  in  his  soul,  and  he  felt  as  though  he 
were  "  drowning  in  sweetness  " ;  and  whether  it  was  the 
voice  of  the  Salvationist  or  of  an  angel  he  cannot  tell, 
but  a  voice  came  to  him  in  his  great  moment  of  ecstasy, 


DE  PROFUNDIS  209 

and  said  to  him  — "  For  the  sake  of  Jesus,  God  pardons 

you." 

"  I  cannot  describe  to  you,"  he  said,  "  the  wonderful 
beauty  of  that  moment.  It  was  an  utter  loss  of  self. 
It  was  an  escape  from  darkness,  an  entrance  into  light. 
Ah,  more  than  that!  I  felt  myself  drowning  in  sweet- 
ness. The  whole  universe  was  one  great  ocean  of  sweet- 
ness and  I  was  drowning  in  it.  But  even  that  cannot 
tell  you  what  I  felt.  Perhaps  it  is  wrong  to  say  I  felt 
anything,  or  thought  anything,  or  realized  anything. 
It  would  be  truer  to  say  I  was  just  conscious  of  sinking 
into  an  ocean  of  sweetness  and  that  my  whole  being  was 
overwhelmed  by  unutterable  joy." 

The  Salvationist  who  was  kneeling  at  his  side,  said 
to  him  — **  Speak  to  the  people."  Without  a  thought  or 
shadow  of  misgiving  he  rose  to  his  feet,  faced  the  whole 
audience,  and  told  them  of  the  new  joy  in  his  heart. 
He  smiled  as  he  said  to  me,  "  I  was  a  wonder  to  my- 
self. Words  poured  from  me.  A  flood  of  words ! " 
Then,  with  grave  countenance,  he  added,  "  Truly  I  may 
say  that  at  that  moment  I  was  filled  with  the  Spirit  of 
God." 

From  that  minute  the  devil  was  exorcised.  He  was 
five-and-twenty  years  of  age;  and  now,  for  twenty- four 
years  of  happiness  and  peace  he  has  never  known  one 
moment  of  temptation  or  heard  one  whisper  from  the 
fiend  that  afflicted  him.  He  has  been  cleansed.  He  has 
been  born  again.  It  is  as  if  he  had  never  committed  his 
sin. 

On  the  day  following  his  conversion,  he  proceeded 
by  train  to  the  town  where  he  intended  to  renew  the 
licence    for   his   saloon.     Suddenly   as   if   a   voice   had 


2IO  OTHER  SHEEP 

spoken  at  his  ear,  he  felt  that  it  was  wrong  to  con- 
tinue in  a  trade  that  spread  so  much  misery  and  de- 
graded so  many  souls.  "  I  felt  that  I  was  stopped  on 
my  journey  by  an  invisible  hand.  I  got  out  at  the  next 
station,  and  made  my  way  home.  But  on  that  return 
journey,  I  stopped  again  and  again,  like  a  man  without 
a  will  of  his  own,  and  though  the  voice  told  me  that  to 
keep  a  saloon  was  inconsistent  with  my  new  birth,  I 
argued  with  myself,  and  said,  '  But  money  is  owing  to 
me;  it  is  my  business,  I  have  a  wife  and  child;  I  have 
no  other  means  of  existence.'  Nevertheless,  the  voice 
conquered  me.  It  repeated  the  word  Inconsistent 
again  and  again.     I  returned,  determined  to  give  it  up." 

But  before  he  took  this  step  he  paid  a  visit  to  the 
Salvationists,  and  asked  them  what  he  should  do.  "  Roll 
your  barrels  and  bottles  into  the  ditch,"  they  told  him; 
"  God  will  provide." 

He  went  back  to  his  house  and  spent  the  entire  night 
in  prayer.  When  the  morning  came  his  soul  was  con- 
vinced and  happy.  He  had  reached  that  point  when 
the  spirit  decides  absolutely  for  a  right  course  and  is  con- 
fident of  God's  approval.  He  took  off  all  his  rings,  his 
watch  and  his  jewellery;  and  put  them  aside  for  ever. 
Then  he  went  to  his  wife  and  told  her  what  he  had  de- 
termined to  do.     She  rejoiced  at  his  decision. 

Ridicule  was  encountered  from  everybody  else.  The 
planters  came  to  the  house  and  rated  him  for  a  fool. 
His  friends  expostulated.  His  relations  objected.  Only 
his  wife  stood  by  him,  and  encouraged  his  action.  At 
a  meeting  which  he  held  in  his  house  a  little  later,  his 
wife  professed  conversion  with  some  of  his  relations. 

He  sold  his  business  and  set  up  an  oilman's  stores. 


DE  PROFUNDIS  211 

A  solicitor  in  the  neighbourhood  undertook  to  collect 
the  considerable  debts  owing  to  him.  In  a  few  months 
he  discovered  that  this  solicitor  was  defrauding  him. 
He  went  to  law  about  the  matter,  and  the  case  was  sent 
to  the  High  Court  at  Colombo.  Before  it  came  on  for 
trial,  he  attended  a  meeting  of  the  Salvation  Army,  and 
after  its  conclusion  was  asked  to  become  an  officer.  He 
replied:  ''I  am  afraid  I  cannot;  I  am  a  family  man; 
and  I  have  just  begun  to  open  a  new  business."  They 
said  to  him,  "  You  have  been  helped,  and  you  should 
give  your  life  to  helping  others ;  come,  we  will  find  some- 
thing for  a  family  man."  He  said,  "  I  must  consult  my 
wife."  "  No,"  they  answered  him,  "  consult  your  own 
heart." 

He  felt  a  powerful  inclination  to  give  up  everything 
and  to  embrace  the  life  of  poverty;  but  the  hesitation, 
and  diffidence,  and  self-distrust,  which  were  character- 
istic of  him  in  those  days,  and  which  now,  transformed 
by  a  profound  religious  experience,  are  the  charm  and 
modesty,  and  self-suppression  of  a  perfectly  pure  soul, 
held  him  in  uncertainty. 

To  his  delight,  when  he  laid  the  matter  before  his  wife, 
she  agreed  to  the  sacrifice,  and  offered  to  become  a  Sal- 
vation Army  officer  with  him. 

In  August,  1887,  he  sold  his  business  and  entered 
with  his  wife  and  child  the  Salvationists'  Training  Home 
in  Colombo.  The  lawsuit  was  still  pending,  and  now, 
with  a  heart  set  on  other  things,  he  petitioned  Govern- 
ment not  to  proceed  with  the  case.  But  it  was  a  crim- 
inal action  and  it  had  to  go  on.  The  lawyer  was  sen- 
tenced to  five  years'  imprisonment. 

And  now  began   for  him,   on  the  very  threshold  of 


212  OTHER  SHEEP 

his  new  life,  trouble  and  persecution.  It  began  with  his 
wife's  complaint  of  loneliness.  Wisely  or  unwisely, 
there  was  a  division  of  sexes  in  the  Training  Home  and 
his  wife  resented  this  separation  and  complained  to 
him  of  loneliness.  Perhaps  she  found  the  rough  lodging 
and  spare  food  of  a  disciple  less  agreeable  than  the 
glowing  vision  of  self-sacrifice.  She  objected  to  wear- 
ing a  uniform,  and  her  child  supported  the  objection 
with  continual  grumblings.  When  he  went  out  into  the 
streets  with  a  begging-bowl  for  food,  his  wife's  com- 
plaints and  objections  became  an  angry  rebellion.  At 
last,  finding  him  determined  to  go  on,  she  left  him,  left 
him  without  word  of  any  kind,  and  took  the  child  to  her 
mother's  house. 

When  he  heard  where  she  was  gone,  loving  her  deeply 
and  being  tenderly  attached  to  his  child,  he  wrote  a  long 
letter  to  her,  begging  her  to  return,  imploring  her  not 
to  break  her  solemn  vows  to  God.  She  answered  the 
letter,  but  refused  to  come  back.  She  said  her  mind 
was  made  up.  Nothing  on  earth  would  induce  her  to 
live  the  life  of  a  Salvationist. 

"  For  five  years,"  he  told  me,  "  I  only  saw  her  once. 
Nothing  that  I  could  say  had  power  to  change  her  reso- 
lution. The  separation  caused  me  great  grief.  I  felt 
the  estrangement  more  than  I  can  tell  you.  It  seemed 
to  me  terrible  that  religion  should  be  the  cause  of  this 
break  in  a  union  which  had  been  so  happy,  and  which 
had  promised  to  be  so  full  of  blessing." 

One  day,  after  these  five  long  years  of  separation  had 
passed,  and  when  he  was  an  officer  doing  great  work 
for  Christianity  among  the  Singhalese,  he  received  a  let- 
ter from  his  wife  saying  that  she  had  thought  matters 


DE  PROFUNDIS  213 

over,  and  had  now  made  up  her  mind  to  enter  the  Train- 
ing Home  and  become  an  officer. 

She  came  and  his  heart  was  on  fire  with  joy  and  grati- 
tude, for  it  needed  but  the  love  of  his  wife  to  make  his 
life  perfect  with  happiness.  But  he  found  that  she 
had  come  back  to  him,  as  the  man  she  loved,  and  not  to 
him  as  the  Salvationist,  whose  manner  of  life  she  still 
regarded  with  irritation  and  aversion. 

"  For  eight  years,"  he  said  to  me,  in  his  quiet  voice, 
a  sad  smile  in  his  grave  eyes,  "  she  was  unsympathetic 
to  our  work.  But  at  last  the  love  of  God  softened  her 
heart.  Ten  or  eleven  years  ago  she  surrendered  her- 
self utterly  to  the  call  of  heaven.  For  ten  or  eleven 
years  she  has  been  to  me  the  most  loving  of  compan- 
ions and  the  most  encouraging  of  help-meets.  She  is 
an  officer  in  the  Army,  and  so  is  one  of  our  sons.  The 
eight  years  seem  now  like  a  night  that  has  passed.  I 
feel  that  for  the  last  ten  or  eleven  years  I  have  been 
living  in  heaven.  She  is  most  earnest,  sympathetic,  and 
helpful.  I  learn  from  her,  and  I  lean  upon  her.  She  is 
like  an  angel,  leading  me  forward." 


BUDDHA-LAND 

The  story  told  in  the  last  chapter  had  Ceylon  for  its 
setting,  but  my  narration  was  purposely  without  colour 
of  scene  or  breath  of  atmosphere.  Now  I  should  like 
to  tell  the  reader  about  that  beautiful  island,  not  only 
because  it  is  so  wonderfully  beautiful,  but  because  I 
there  came  across  one  or  two  stories  of  a  profoundly 
interesting  nature  and  made  acquaintance  with  Buddhism 
as  it  really  is  and  not  as  it  is  made  to  appear  in  books 
of  theosophy. 

India  is  like  a  huge  ear,  and  from  the  narrowing  lobe, 
suspended  by  the  blue  ribbon  of  the  sea,  Ceylon  hangs 
gleaming  like  a  pearl.  One  is  apt  to  think  about  it  as 
a  Wight  of  our  Indian  Empire,  a  tiny  jewel  almost  in- 
significant in  relation  to  the  vastness  of  its  neighbour- 
ing continent.  But  in  truth  there  is  a  majesty  and 
splendour  in  this  glittering  island,  a  majesty  of  moun- 
tains and  a  splendour  of  forest  which  breathe  into  the 
mind  a  sense  of  grandeur  and  destroy  the  illusion  of 
littleness.  Ceylon  is  nearly  as  big  as  Ireland,  it  has  a 
mountain  zone  of  over  four  thousand  miles,  its  highest 
peak  pierces  the  blue  sky  eight  thousand  feet  above  the 
whisper  of  its  waves,  forests  thick  as  earth's  earliest 
ages  still  riot  over  five  thousand  square  miles  of  this 
garden  island,  and  in  the  deep  solitude  of  those  forests 
as  many  as  five  thousand  wild  elephants,  with  panthers 
and  jackals,  find  their  living  and  keep  their  freedom. 

214 


BUDDHA-LAND  215 

Then  there  are  the  broad  waters  of  Ceylon  —  tanks,  riv- 
ers,  lagoons,  and  backwaters :  — 

In  the  plains  there  are  comparatively  few  rivulets 
or  running  streams ;  the  rivers  there  flow  in  almost 
solitary  lines  to  the  sea.  .  .  .  But  in  their  course 
through  the  hills  and  the  broken  ground  at  their  base 
they  are  supplied  by  numerous  feeders,  which  convey 
to  them  the  frequent  showers  that  fall  in  these  high 
altitudes.  Hence  their  tracks  are  through  some  of 
the  noblest  scenery  in  the  world;  rushing  through 
ravines  and  glens,  and  falling  over  precipitous  rocks 
in  the  depths  of  wooded  valleys,  they  exhibit  a  suc- 
cession of  rapids,  cataracts,  and  torrents  unsurpassed 
in  magnificence  and  beauty.  On  reaching  the  plains, 
the  boldness  of  their  march  and  the  graceful  outline 
of  their  sweep  are  indicative  of  the  little  obstruction 
opposed  by  the  sandy  and  porous  soil  through  which 
they  flow.  Throughout  their  entire  course  dense  for- 
ests shade  their  banks. 

The  traveller,  however  great  his  experience  of  the 
globe,  soon  loses  in  Ceylon  that  irritating  glance  of  con- 
descension with  which  he  is  occasionally  apt  to  survey 
small  islands  and  little  peoples.  A  few  miles  out  from 
the  Sea  Capital,  with  its  unequalled  sunsets  and  its  whis- 
pering palms,  he  finds  himself  in  the  midst  of  sublime 
mountains,  and  in  the  centre  of  unhandselled  forest. 
Even  the  extreme  loveliness  of  slender  trees,  the  bright 
green  of  the  valleys  and  hedgerows,  the  midsummer 
pageant  of  wild  flowers,  the  gentle  music  of  little  brooks 
and  rustling  waterfalls,  do  not  beguile  from  his  mind  by 
the  affectionate  tenderness  of  their  beauty,  the  sense  of 


2i6  OTHER  SHEEP 

grandeur  which  comes  to  him  from  the  scarred  crest  of 
the  tall  mountains  and  the  sense  of  age-long  majesty 
which  breathes  into  his  soul  from  the  crowding  splen- 
dour of  the  forest. 

I  can  recall  now  as  if  it  were  yesterday  the  morning 
on  which  I  travelled  by  train  from  the  Sea  Capital  to 
the  Hill  Capital.  After  leaving  Colombo  and  crossing 
a  valley  brilliant  with  the  green  of  rice-fields,  gorgeous 
with  the  crimson  and  gold  of  wild  flowers,  and  tropical 
with  the  heavy  luxuriance  of  coco-nut  palms,  plantains, 
and  bamboos,  the  train  wound  its  way  into  the  hills  and 
began  its  six-thousand-feet  climb  into  the  mountains. 
The  track  lies  on  the  edge  of  a  mountain  range,  and, 
across  a  green  plain  glittering  with  ribbons  of  water  and 
dense  with  foliage,  one  looks  to  another  range  of  moun- 
tains which  completely  rings  in  the  shining, garden  be- 
low one's  gaze.  On  the  day  that  I  made  this  journey, 
all  round  the  wide  and  distant  circle  of  the  hills,  great 
burly  clouds  of  silver-white  were  bursting  like  waves 
against  the  russet  peaks  of  the  mountains,  sending  up  a 
smoky  spray,  and  pouring  over  the  rugged  crags  a 
veritable  foam  of  vapour.  Above  them  the  arc  of  heaven 
was  a  moist  blue,  trembling  with  beauty  and  quiver- 
ing with  light;  but  all  round  the  tops  of  the  mountains 
it  was  as  if  a  tempest  raged,  and  as  if  an  angry  sea  hid- 
den by  their  walls  of  stone,  was  buffetting  those  mighty 
rocks  and  sending  high  into  the  air  the  broken  fury  of 
its  waves.  It  almost  seemed  as  if  the  torrent  of, those 
broken  waves  would  stream  like  a  flood  down  the  moun- 
tain-side, submerging  the  valley  and  filling  to  the  very 
brim  the  mighty  basin  of  the  hills. 

And  beneath  the  crest  of  these  hills,  which  shone  red- 


BUDDHA-LAND  217 

gold  against  the  clouds,  like  a  cloak  thrown  carelessly 
over  the  shoulders  the  forest  descended  in  great  folds 
of  green  to  the  tilled  orderliness  and  garden  quiet  of  the 
plains.  In  the  midst  of  this  jungle  growth,  one  saw  the 
slender  silver  trunks  and  scarlet  flowers  of  the  cotton- 
tree,  the  tall  Palmyra  palm  loaded  with  its  plumes  of 
clouded  yellow,  the  soft  and  tender  branches  of  the 
acacia,  the  wide  and  drooping  fronds  of  the  coco-nut 
palm,  and  clumps  of  orange-coloured  bamboos,  whose 
feathery  green  leaves  stood  out  from  the  darkness  of 
enormous  rhododendrons.  For  the  rest,  great  cumbrous 
trunks  and  spreading  boughs  filled  the  whole  scene  of 
the  forest  with  strength  and  power. 

Monkeys  could  be  seen  leaping  from  tree  to  tree,  their 
young  clutching  them  from  below;  the  lakes  and  pools 
were  bordered  by  storks  and  herons  and  flamingoes 
standing  like  statues  in  the  still  water;  the  bushes  glit- 
tered with  the  plumage  of  fly-catchers  and  parakeets; 
the  fields  below  were  being  ploughed  by  buffaloes,  and 
overhead  one  saw  the  wide-winged  hawk  "  sailing  with 
supreme  dominion  through  the  azure  deep  of  air." 

Such  a  morning  it  was,  too,  when  the  heart  of  the 
great  earth  can  be  seen  beating  under  her  vesture  of 
spring,  when  the  air  becomes  visible  like  a  blue  water, 
and  the  rays  of  the  morning  sun  are  like  a  mist  of  fire. 
Everything  seemed  to  swim  in  an  ether  that  throbbed 
with  the  joyous  travail  of  existence ;  a  faint  dimness  like 
the  moisture  of  a  girl's  eye  softened  all  lines  and  sub- 
dued all  colours ;  and  a  gentle  wind  fresh  as  the  ululating 
rustle  of  a  summer  sea  moved  the  glimmering  air  with  a 
breath  that  sparkled  like  the  dew. 

The  dust  of  India,  the  depression  of  India,  the  wist- 


2i8  OTHER  SHEEP 

ful  sadness  and  shabby  melancholy  of  India,  nowhere 
molest  the  beauty  of  this  darling  island  floating  like  the 
reflection  of  a  skyey  Paradise  on  the  bosom  of  the  In- 
dian Ocean.  It  is,  indeed,  a  little  Eden,  demi-Paradise, 
and  its  luring  air,  sweet  with  every  scent  and  odour  of 
the  angels'  garden,  is  fresh  with  the  sense  of  morning 
and  glad  with  the  hope  of  Spring. 

As  clearly,  too,  can  I  remember  a  night  in  this  lovely 
island,  when  my  friend  and  I,  who  had  rested  at  Kandy, 
some  two  thousand  feet  above  sea-level,  left  the  railway 
at  a  small  station,  and  journeyed  by  bullock-cart  into  the 
wilderness  of  the  interior.  Fakir  Singh  had  told  me 
that  if  I  wished  to  see  something  of  village  existence  in 
Ceylon,  I  could  not  do  better  than  go  to  a  little  far- 
away hamlet  where  he  w^as  carrying  his  magic  lantern  to 
hold  a  meeting  in  the  forest.  My  friend  and  I  drove  to 
the  Gardens  of  Peradeniya  in  the  afternoon,  where  the 
air,  laden  with  the  scent  of  many  spices,  was  black  with 
flying- foxes,  startled  by  a  gunshot;  and  after  seeing  the 
trees  and  flowers  and  shrubs  of  these  famous  Gardens 
we  drove  to  another  station  and  took  train  for  the  little 
town  where  a  bullock-cart  was  awaiting  us.  It  was  to- 
wards evening  when  we  arrived,  and  after  being  jolted 
in  a  springless  cart  over  as  rough  a  track  on  the  earth's 
surface  as  ever  presumed  to  call  itself  a  road,  we  arrived 
at  our  destination  with  the  setting  of  the  sun. 

A  visit  from  Fakir  Singh,  all  over  India  and  Ceylon, 
is  regarded  as  a  great  event  by  his  co-religionists.  We 
found  a  procession  of  Salvationists,  headed  by  banners 
and  music,  waiting  to  give  him  welcome.  After  greet- 
ings, exchanged  wdiile  the  little  humped  bullocks  were 
being  unyoked  before  a  humble  inn,  the  procession  re- 


BUDDHA-LAND  219 

formed  and  marched  forward,  by  way  of  a  wooded  lane 
impossible  even  for  the  wheels  of  a  bullock-cart.  At 
the  end  of  this  cool  and  scented  lane  was  a  stile  in  the 
hedge,  and  the  stile  led  precipitously  down  into  rice- 
fields,  flooded  with  the  rays  of  the  setting  sun.  We 
scrambled  over  the  stile  and  slid  and  tumbleci  down  the 
steep  bank  into  the  fields.  A  narrow  path,  raised  a  few 
inches  above  the  muddy  bed  of  the  rice,  crossed  the  wide 
fields  and  wound  its  way  to  a  forest  on  the  further  side. 
A  little  brook  intersected  these  fields,  and  as  we  got 
upon  the  plank  that  bridged  it,  I  noticed  an  adder  in 
the  water.  Quick  as  lightning  one  of  the  Native  Salva- 
tionists plunged  his  arm  into  the  stream  and  brought 
out  the  squirming  snake,  his  hand  grasping  it  just  below 
the  head.  "  He  can  catch  any  snake,"  I  was  told.  "  He 
is  a  snake-man,  and  knows  how  to  catch  them."  He 
let  the  snake  lick  his  nose,  said  something  and  threw 
it  back  into  the  water.  I  asked  what  he  had  said,  and 
inquired  why  he  had  not  killed  the  reptile.  "  He  said 
that  it  was  not  a  poisonous  snake,"  came  the  answer; 
"  as  for  killing  it,  he  never  kills  any  snakes,  not  even 
the  dangerous  ones ;  it  is  bad  luck."  "  But  he  is  a  Chris- 
tian, and  no  longer  looks  on  a  snake  as  god  or  devil?" 
"  Ah,  but  it  is  a  superstition !  He  would  not  kill  a 
snake." 

Following  at  the  end  of  the  loitering  procession,  I 
was  struck  by  the  picturesque  character  of  the  scene. 
Like  a  many-coloured  serpent,  winding  with  the  narrow 
footpath  and  dazzled  by  the  sun,  the  long  line  of  happy 
and  brightly-dressed  humanity  seemed,  even  while  it 
shone  so  vividly  in  the  midst  of  the  green  fields,  to  be 
trivial  and  insignificant,  so  vast  was  the  sense  of  dis- 


J220  OTHER  SHEEP 

tance  and  so  overpowering  the  sense  of  the  sky's  height. 
Far  away  across  the  fields  of  rice  rose  the  forest  and 
above  the  forest  rose  the  mountains  and  above  the  moun- 
tains rose  the  sky.  And  the  long  line  of  humanity 
softly  laughing  and  gently  talking  in  the  midst  of  sunken 
fields,  some  of  the  tambourines  tinkling  against  the  saris 
of  the  women,  had  its  face  towards  the  setting  of  the 
sun  —  an  immense  arch  of  molten  gold  which  was  like 
a  gateway  into  everlasting  glory.  The  air  of  the  fields 
was  quiet  with  the  feelings  and  thoughts  of  evening.  A 
solemn  stillness  held  the  woods.  A  majestic  peace 
brooded  on  the  mountains.  It  was  only  in  the  distant 
west,  where  the  mighty  conflagration  of  the  sun  throbbed 
and  vibrated  with  great  beats  of  shuddering  fire,  that  one 
was  conscious  of  machinery  and  toil. 

We  entered  the  forest  by  means  of  a  bridge  and  found 
ourselves  all  at  once  in  a  deep  gloom.  Our  forest  path 
ascended  from  the  low  level  of  the  rice-fields  ,  and 
swerved  away  over  a  soft  floor  of  dusky  brown  into  the 
heart  of  the  woods ;  the  huge  trunks  of  darkening  trees 
loomed  up  into  the  dim  air  like  massy  pillars  carrying 
the  branching  roof  of  a  temple.  A  cloistral  silence 
hung  like  a  thick  curtain  from  the  over-arching  boughs. 
The  faint  patches  of  pulsing  light  which  here  and  there 
glimmered  on  the  ground  were  like  the  fading  reflec- 
tions from  a  painted  window  or  the  fragments  of  a 
broken  mosaic.  And  the  floor  of  the  forest  rose  and 
fell  in  a  chaos  of  quiet,  as  if  the  earth  had  once  long 
ago  writhed  under  the  monotony  of  the  shadowing  trees 
until  their  roots  had  fastened  upon  her  and  held  her 
still. 

The  silence  was  presently  broken  by  the  loud  bark- 


BUDDHA-LAND  221 

ing  of  dogs,  and  a  sweep  of  our  winding,  ascending,  and 
descending  path  brought  us  in  a  few  moments  before  a 
mud-house  with  a  veranda  of  palm-leaves  set  in  a  clear- 
ing of  the  forest.  In  front  of  this  house  rose  a  small 
stack  of  some  rough  grass,  faggots  of  wood,  and  a  barn 
for  rice.  To  the  right  was  a  line  of  outhouses,  at  the 
corner  of  which  two  or  three  dogs  were  chained  to  tub- 
kennels.  Two  Native  women  were  lighting  lamps  of 
coco-nut-oil,  which  they  hung  in  the  veranda.  Mats 
were  spread  on  the  floor  under  these  lamps,  and  here 
we  were  invited  to  seat  ourselves  and  eat  the  curry  and 
rice  prepared  for  us  by  the  host  of  Fakir  Singh.  Dur- 
ing this  meal  we  talked  in  low  voices,  and  as  the  dark- 
ness deepened  all  around  us  there  came  from  the  forest 
the  noise  of  frogs  and  crickets,  growing  louder  and 
louder  till  the  whole  earth  seemed  to  ring  with  it.  And 
then  as  if  fairies  were  dancing  through  the  trees  to  dress 
their  Arcady  for  the  delight  of  the  Fakir,  the  air  sud- 
denly began  to  twinkle  with  innumerable  lights  and 
these  little  glowing  points  of  fire  rose  to  the  very  tops 
of  the  trees,  fluttered  down  the  dim  trunks,  and  drifted 
hither  and  thither  in  a  slow  eternal  motion  —  fire-flies 
brighter  than  glow-worms  and  as  numerous  as  the  stars. 
A  little  later  and  the  forest  became  lit  up  here  and  there 
with  a  smoky  haze  of  ruddy  fire,  where  com.panies  of 
people  from  distant  villages  were  making  their  way  by 
torchlight  to  the  scene  of  the  meeting.  And  when  it 
came  for  us  to  depart,  we  also  found  our  way  through 
the  forest  with  these  flaming  torches  —  torches  nearly 
six  feet  in  length,  composed  of  coco-nut  leaves  banded 
tightly  together,  which  burn  with  a  leaping  roar  and  a 
scarlet  flame  for  ten  or  fifteen  minutes.     It  was  a  jour- 


'222  OTHER  SHEEP 

ney  of  enchantment,  to  walk  with  the  rising  and  falling 
floor  of  the  forest,  swinging  one  of  these  long  torches, 
seeing  the  stately  trunks  of  the  trees  lit  redly  up  in  a 
smoke  of  fire  and  to  watch  the  crowding  shadows  on 
the  ground  in  front  of  us.  All  the  air  was  ringing  with 
the  rattle  of  frogs  and  the  chirping  of  crickets,  and 
outside  the  little  radius  of  one's  guttering  torch  the  whole 
forest  twinkled  with  fire-flies. 

The  meeting  was  held  in  a  space  between  two  houses, 
roofed  in  for  the  occasion  by  palm-leaves  supported  on 
poles  of  bamboo.  There  was  a  rough  platform  at  one 
end,  part  of  which  was  under  the  veranda  of  a  dwelling- 
house;  and  beside  this  platform  was  a  stretched  sheet 
where  the  magic  lantern  was  making  a  disc  of  white 
light,  in  which  one  saw  magnified  insects  on  the  other 
side  of  the  sheet  fluttering  backwards  and  forwards  beat- 
ing their  wings  against  the  obstruction.  For  the  rest, 
from  one  end  of  the  space  to  the  other,  there  was  a 
great  multitude  of  people  sitting  on  the  ground,  their 
dark,  intelligent  faces  lifted  to  the  screen,  their  hands 
folded  in  their  laps.  The  women  sat  by  themselves, 
many  of  them  with  babies  in  their  arms;  and  one  saw 
in  the  light  of  the  lamps  how  beautiful  they  were  and 
how  superior  to  Indian  women  in  dignity  and  vivacity. 
The  men  were  also  of  handsome  appearance,  but  some- 
thing effeminate,  their  long  hair  knotted  over  the  neck 
and  fastened  on  the  top  by  a  large  comb;  they  had  dig- 
nity of  expression  and  a  certain  nobility  of  features, 
but  they  wanted  the  gaiety  and  alacrity  which  made  the 
women  so  wonderfully  pleasant  to  eyes  fresh  from  In- 
dia. Shoulder  to  shoulder,  a  dense  mass  of  humanity, 
crowding  the  whole  space  of  the  pandal  from  end  to 


BUDDHA-LAND  227, 

end,  these  forest  people  sang  hymns  to  God,  prayed  in 
the  Name  of  Jesus,  and  Hstened  with  an  unquestioning 
eagerness  to  the  words  of  the  Fakir. 

My  friend  and  I  were  obHged  to  leave  this  meeting 
before  its  conclusion,  and  with  three  Singhalese  Salva- 
tionists to  guide  our  feet  and  carry  our  torches  we  made 
our  way  through  the  forest,  crossed  the  rice-fields,  and 
arrived  at  last  before  the  inn  where  our  bullocks  had  been 
unyoked.  The  driver  had  seen  the  flare  of  our  torches 
and  had  wandered  off  in  search  of  his  oxen.  We  went 
inside  the  humble  inn,  which  was  a  black  and  smoky  in- 
terior like  an  inferior  fowl-house,  and  drank  tonic  water 
and  ate  biscuits  from  Reading.  Outside  the  Salvation- 
ists were  filling  the  starry  heavens  with  loud  and  pro- 
longed calls  to  the  invisible  driver  of  the  bullock-cart  — 
Coo-e!  Coo-o-o-o-ee ! !  Coo-o-o-o-o-o-o-e-e-e-E ! ! !  After 
some  ten  or  fifteen  minutes,  he  appeared  with  his  little 
oxen,  and  helped  by  the  Salvationists  got  them  yoked  to 
the  cart  and  his  lamps  lighted.     Then  we  started  off. 

The  driver  turned  out  to  be  a  nervous  fellow,  fright- 
ened of  the  dark.  Our  road  led  through  thick  forest, 
and  not  even  the  host  of  fire-flies,  which  swarmed  in 
every  tree  bordering  our  way  could  chase  the  darkness 
out  of  our  path.  The  driver  sat  bunched  up  on  the  pole, 
jerking  the  reins,  rocking  his  body  backwards  and  for- 
wards like  the  cox  of  a  beaten  boat,  twisting  the  tails 
of  his  cattle,  and  talking  to  himself  in  a  frightened  un- 
dertone. As  we  had  a  train  to  catch,  and  the  last  train 
of  the  night,  we  bade  him  hurry,  but  he  shook  his  head, 
pointed  to  the  dark  air  above  our  heads  and  to  the  black 
road  under  our  wheels.  Every  now  and  then  a  more 
than  usually  dislocating  bump  quenched  the  glimmer  of 


224  OTHER  SHEEP 

a  lamp,  and  immediately  he  jerked  the  bullocks  back  on 
their  haunches,  sprang  to  the  ground,  and  with  trembling 
hands  proceeded  to  strike  imperfect  matches.  My  trav- 
elling companion,  more  used  to  motor-cars  than  bullock- 
carts,  decided  to  walk,  and  as  the  night  was  hot,  took 
off  his  coat  and  carrying  it  over  an  arm  stalked  on 
ahead  with  the  little  torch  of  a  long  cigar  to  light  his 
way.  As  he  went  he  dropped  out  of  the  pocket  of  his 
coat,  without  observing  the  loss,  an  envelope  containing 
a  letter  of  credit  for  some  hundreds  of  pounds  and  a 
letter  of  indication.  Two  or  three  weeks  afterwards  the 
envelope  with  its  contents  was  restored  to  him  by  the 
Colombo  police. 

The  warm  night,  scented  with  the  odours  of  spice 
gardens  and  the  deep  perfume  of  the  forest,  made  the 
journey  even  in  a  bullock-cart  one  of  exceeding  charm. 
At  long  intervals  on  the  road,  a  little  company  of  white- 
clad  barefoot  men,  accompanied  by  dogs,  would  sud- 
denly appear  in  the  light  of  our  lamps,  stare  in  at  us 
with  frowning  eyes,  and  then  disappear  into  the  dark- 
ness, their  voices  drowned  by  the  gridding  of  our 
wheels.  But  for  the  most  part  it  was  a  journey  through 
darkness  and  silence,  with  the  glitter  of  fire-flies  on  either 
side  of  us,  the  broken  light  of  sprinkled  stars  overhead 
and  the  sense  of  dim  columns  rising  up  in  the  gloom 
and  crowding  close  about  us  like  an  invading  army.  In 
this  central  and  enclosing  darkness,  our  little  cart  with 
its  foggy  lamps  and  its  steaming  and  grunting  bullocks 
crept  along,  bumping  and  jolting,  like  a  moth  with  a 
broken  wing. 

At  the  station  we  found  the  bridge  spanning  the  line, 
and  all  the  approaches  and  doorways  strewn  with  sheeted 


BUDDHA-LAND  225 

figures.  We  were  told  that  some  were  pilgrims  waiting 
for  a  morning  train,  and  some  were  coolies  employed 
at  the  station  whose  work  would  begin  early  in  the 
dawn.  The  stir  and  movement  of  the  station,  and  the 
clangour  of  a  shunting  train,  seemed  to  make  no  dif- 
ference to  the  repose  of  the  sleepers,  who  lay  as  still  as 
the  dead. 

In  the  refreshment  car  of  our  midnight  train  we  found 
a  company  of  over-dressed  and  loud-talking  Eurasians 
(Burghers  as  they  are  called  in  Ceylon)  whose  tumblers 
of  whisky  had  spilled  jerkings  of  liquor  on  to  the  cigar- 
ash  scattered  over  their  littered  table.  The  noise  of  their 
voices  —  they  were  speaking  in  English  —  the  offensive 
braggadocio  of  their  vulgar  talk,  the  smell  of  the  car, 
and  the  quality  of  their  cigars  —  made  too  great  a  con- 
trast after  the  solemnity  and  silence  and  breathing  sweet- 
ness of  the  forest.  We  turned  out,  and  continued  a  hun- 
gry and  thirsty  journey  ir  an  ordinary  carriage. 

We  had  returned  to  Kandy,  because  of  an  invitation 
from  a  young  and  devout  Buddhist  to  visit  the  holy 
shrine  which  guards  the  tooth  of  the  Buddha.  Early 
after  breakfast  on  the  next  day  wc  walked  to  the  beau- 
tiful little  temple  where  this  relic  is  kept,  and  passed 
from  the  dazzling  sunlight  and  fresh  air  of  the  mountain 
town,  into  the  shadows  and  closeness  of  the  temple's 
precincts.  We  passed  under  cloisters,  crossed  a  court- 
yard, and  stopped  before  a  counter  stocked  with  trays 
of  flower  petals,  behind  which  a  priest  in  a  soiled  and 
shabby  yellow  robe  was  standing  like  a  sentinel.  Our 
companion  took  off  his  boots,  received  a  little  basket  of 
jasmine  flowers  from  the  priest,  and  going  forward  in 
his  stockinged   feet  led  us  up   a   flight  of  oak   stairs 


226  OTHER  SHEEP 

crowded  with  pilgrims  into  the  outer  court  of  the  tem- 
ple. 

"  These  people,"  he  explained,  "  do  not  come  here  to 
pray.  You  will  see  them  kneeling  before  the  shrine,  but 
you  must  not  think  that  they  are  addressing  supplica- 
tions to  Buddha.  We  recognize  that  Buddha  cannot 
help  us.  Pilgrims  to  this  shrine  come  to  gain  merit.  It 
is  with  us  a  meritorious  act  to  visit  the  shrines  conse- 
crated by  the  holy  life  of  Buddha.  One  kneels  down, 
not  to  pray,  but  to  think  of  Buddha,  to  think  of  his  life 
and  to  meditate  on  his  chief  doctrines." 

Before  us  hung  a  dark-coloured  curtain.  Our  friend 
drew  this  on  one  side,  and  we  found  ourselves  before 
the  shrine. 

Quite  close  to  us,  on  passing  through  the  doorway, 
rose  the  sacred  altar,  for  this  shrine  is  no  bigger  than 
a  box-room.  The  little  apartment,  windowless  and 
heavily  ornamented  with  fading  gold  and  decaying  tapes- 
try, was  illumined  by  candles.  A  casket  of  gold  and  sil- 
ver, encrusted  with  precious  stones,  stood  on  the  altar; 
below  it  on  an  immense  tray  was  a  heap  of  flower 
petals.  Beside  the  altar  was  the  priest  in  his  yellow 
robe,  the  head  and  face  clean  shaven,  one  arm  obtruding 
bare  from  his  yellow  robe.     A  youth  stood  at  his  side. 

Our  friend  presented  his  basket-tray  of  jasmine  flow- 
ers, which  the  priest  accepted  and  placed  on  the  altar. 
They  spoke  together  for  a  minute,  and  then  our  friend 
moved  to  one  side  of  the  shrine  and  washed  his  hands  — 
whether  by  command  of  the  priest  after  contact  with 
Europeans  or  as  part  of  the  ceremony  I  could  not  un- 
derstand. Tapers  were  then  lighted  and  we  were  al- 
lowed to  approach  close  to  the  altar  and  examine  the 


BUDDHA-LAND  227 

design  of  the  casket  and  the  beauty  of  its  jewellery. 
We  were  told  that  such-an-one  had  given  this  precious 
stone  and  such-an-other  had  given  that,  and  how  much 
the  diamonds  were  worth,  and  how  much  the  pearls,  and 
how  much  the  rubies;  and  how  all  this  here  was  real 
gold,  and  how  all  that  over  there  was  real  silver  —  till 
one  felt  as  if  one  were  standing  before  the  shrine  of 
Carlo  Borromeo  under  the  altar  of  that  marble  wedding- 
cake  at  Milan. 

The  twinkling  candles  in  this  dark  little  shrine  of 
metal  and  tapestry,  the  heavy  scent  of  flowers,  the  sub- 
dued gleam  of  gold  and  silver,  the  soft  glow  and  sparkle 
of  precious  stones  starting  out  of  the  shadows,  and  the 
figure  of  the  shaven  priest  in  his  yellow  robe,  so  kindly 
in  appearance  and  so  indulgent  in  his  courtesy  —  made 
an  impression  on  the  mind  which  the  vulgarity  of  sight- 
seeing could  not  minimize  or  obliterate.  But  the  chief 
feeling  that  one  had  was  of  the  extraordinarily  close  sim- 
ilarity of  Latin  Christianity  and  pre-Christian  Buddhism, 
the  feeling  and  the  sensation  of  a  same  immemorial  su- 
perstition persisting  through  the  forms  and  ritual  of  two 
religions  so  diametrically  opposed  as  the  religion  of  An- 
nihilation and  the  religion  of  Life. 

This  feeling  w^as  intensified  when  we  turned  our  backs 
upon  the  tooth  in  its  casket  —  a  tooth  which  I  am  told 
is  as  large  as  an  elephant's  —  and  visited  some  of  the 
other  shrines  surrounding  the  temple.  After  throwing 
from  the  balcony  of  the  library  arecanut  flowers  to  the 
huge  tortoises  In  the  temple  tank,  we  made  a  round  of 
the  shrines,  studying  crude  pictures  of  hell  as  childish 
and  disgusting  as  those  of  the  Campo  Santo  at  Pisa, 
and    observing    the    faithful    at    their    devotions.     We 


228  OTHER  SHEEP 

learned  that  women  come  to  these  shrines  to  ask  favours, 
not  to  seek  holiness  or  to  acquire  strength  for  victory 
over  sin,  and  that  they  have  their  favourite  shrines  for 
this  purpose.  So  in  Italy  you  may  see  poor  peasants 
kneeling  with  apparently  the  most  rapt  devotion  before 
a  tinsel  figure  of  the  Mother  of  Jesus  stuck  all  over  with 
sham  jewellery,  crowned  with  a  coronet,  and  illumined 
by  coloured  candles;  and  you  will  learn  that  they  are 
praying  for  luck  in  the  next  lottery  and  that  they  say  to 
each  other,  "  Such  and  such  a  Madonna  is  no  good ;  I 
prayed  to  her  for  six  months  and  the  jade  did  nothing 
for  me;  you  should  try  Our  Lady  of  S.  Agostino."  ^ 

The  likeness  which  exists  between  the  priests  of  all 
religions  is  very  remarkable.  Just  as  there  is  a  likeness 
between  soldiers  of  every  country,  so  in  the  priests  of 
Buddhism,  Hinduism,  and  Catholicism  there  is  a  very 
strong  and  notable  family  resemblance.  The  bare-headed, 
yellow-robed  and  sandalled  priests  striding  under  their 
umbrellas  in  the  streets  of  Kandy,  each  followed  by  a 
loose-lipped  and  sensual-looking  boy,  have  just  the  ex- 

1  It  is  not  long  since  the  report  was  spread,  that  one  day  when  a 
poor  woman  called  upon  this  image  of  the  Madonna  for  help,  it  be- 
gan to  speak,  and  replied,  "  If  I  had  only  something,  then  I  could 
help  thee,  but  I  myself  am  so  poor !  "  This  story  was  circulated, 
and  very  soon  throngs  of  credulous  people  hastened  hither  to  kiss 
the  foot  of  the  Madonna,  and  to  present  her  with  all  kinds  of  gifts. 
The  image  .  .  .  now  sits  shining  with  ornaments  of  gold  and 
precious  stones.  Candles  and  lamps  burn  around,  and  people  pour 
in,  rich  and  poor,  great  and  small,  to  kiss  —  some  of  them  two  or 
three  times  —  the  Madonna's  foot.  .  .  .  Below  the  altar  it  is  in- 
scribed m  golden  letters  that  Pius  VII  promised  two  hundred  days' 
absolution  to  all  such  as  should  kiss  the  Madonna's  foot  and  pray 
with  the  whole  heart  Ave  Maria.  Frederika  Bremer,  quoted  in 
Hare's  Walks  in  Rome,  p.  443- 


BUDDHA-LAND  229 

pression  of  intellectual  power,  bigotry,  and  contempt  for 
every  knowledge  except  their  own  craft,  which  one  is 
accustomed  to  see  in  the  faces  of  European  priests. 
They  are  fine-looking  and  striking-looking  men,  but  they 
are  tyrants.  The  loftiness  and  self-confidence  of  their 
appearance  are  the  fruit  of  a  conceit,  a  vanity,  and  an 
arrogance  from  which  the  man  of  science,  the  historian, 
and  the  inspired  poet  would  shrink  horrified  and  ashamed. 
They  bear  upon  their  brows  the  seal  of  a  petty  tyranny 
and  the  mark  of  a  pettifogging  pride;  whether  they  be 
Brahmans,  Buddhists,  or  Romans,  it  is  the  same;  you 
may  see  written  in  all  their  faces  by  the  unerring  hand 
of  their  own  souls  the  "  Thank  God  I  am  not  as  other 
men,"  which  has  ever  marked  the  Pharisee  from  those 
who  weigh  and  examine  tradition,  and  who  give  to 
Truth  what  these  others  abdicate  to  authority  —  their 
reason  and  their  life.  The  complete  surrender  of  the 
reason  to  a  set  of  ideas  which  cannot  be  proved  and 
which  are  as  repugnant  to  common  sense  as  they  are 
contrary  to  experience,  seems  to  affect  the  countenance 
of  man  in  the  same  way  all  over  the  world  however  con- 
trary and  antagonistic  the  sets  of  ideas  may  be. 

At  the  famous  mountain  temples  hewn  out  of  the  rocks 
of  Dambulla  and  Matale,  we  found  tawdry  decorations, 
shabby  pretentiousness  and  infantile  frescoes.  The  pil- 
grim who  climbs  from  the  road  into  the  mountains  by 
graceful  but  most  tiring  steps,  who  mounts  the  high 
rocks  plastered  with  bats  at  their  shadowed  summits, 
and  wanders  with  a  winding  path  through  beautiful 
grassy  places  happy  with  birds  and  butterflies  and  flow- 
ers, must  surely  be  vexed  and  disappointed  when,  breath- 
less, exhausted,  and  with  aching  legs,  he  comes  before 


230  OTHER  SHEEP 

these  trumpeted  shrines.  A  roof  of  zinc  covers  the  ve- 
randa, a  bell-pull  of  barbed  wire  hangs  beside  a  blistered 
door  of  deal,  fading  pictures  of  hell  peel  on  the  walls, 
and  inside  the  temples  —  which  smell  foully  of  damp 
and  darkness  and  stone,  and  which  he  enters  surrounded 
by  priestly  and  lay  hangers-on  eager  for  a  rupee  —  he 
finds  nothing  but  Megalomania.  One  recumbent  figure 
of  Buddha  measured  forty-seven  feet!  The  scheme  of 
colour  throughout  is  red  and  yellow.  The  whole  effect 
is  gross  and  grotesque.  A  cavern  of  gloom  whose  walls 
are  shaped  into  sleeping  Polyphemi!  Every  figure  of 
Buddha  is  shown  to  one  with  a  yard  measure. 

One  of  the  saints  led  me  to  a  hollowed  space  in  the 
floor  of  a  temple  where  water  quivered  in  the  dim  light. 
"  It  is  by  the  Will  of  God,"  he  said  amiably;  ''  you  can- 
not see  the  water  fall  and  no  man  knows  where  it  goes; 
it  is  by  the  Will  of  God."  The  ground  on  which  we 
stood  was  a  slop  of  mud;  I  looked  up  to  the  roof,  and 
saw  that  the  rocks  were  wet,  green,  and  slimy;  a  drop 
of  water  fell  as  I  looked  and  splashed  into  the  pool;  as 
for  where  the  water  goes  the  saint  himself  had  told  me 
that  a  large  basin  was  filled  twice  daily  from  this  pool 
'for  use  in  the  temple.  But  one  saw  in  the  man's  face 
the  look  of  a  child  that  loves  to  deceive  itself  and  be 
deceived ;  it  would  have  been  cruel  to  destroy  his  ''  Will 
of  God  "  with  a  fact  in  natural  law ;  he  was  of  the  great 
host  antl  company  who  regard  credulity  as  a  virtue  and 
the  abnegation  of  divine  reason  as  an  act  pleasing  to 
God. 

But,  the  poor  fellow's  face  when  he  examined  my 
bakshish!  He  expostulated,  and  argued,  and  spread  his 
arms,  and  surveyed  me  —  man  of  God  that  he  was  — 


BUDDHA-LAND  231 

with  a  most  unholy  and  murderous  contempt.  The 
spirit  of  Buddha  vanished  from  his  mild  eyes  and  ami- 
able lips;  he  became  angry,  derisive,  rude.  And  as  our 
servant  distributed  a  few  annas  among  the  hangers-on 
of  this  priest,  they  too  fell  a-quarrelling,  so  that  the 
whole  scene  was  like  a  scramble  on  a  race-course.  We 
left  them  and  crossed  the  natural  platform  of  rock,  fol- 
lowed by  our  grinning  Hindu  who  had  thoroughly  en- 
joyed this  altercation  and  had  told  the  hangers-on  of 
the  priests  many  hitherto  unpublished  particulars  con- 
cerning their  ancestors;  and  from  the  edge  of  the  bastion 
we  looked  over  a  panorama  of  beauty  so  enchanting 
after  the  grotesque,  childish,  and  vulgar  Megalomania  of 
the  temple,  that  one  could  almost  have  prayed  to  it. 
The  distant  mountains  melted  into  the  pearl-coloured 
clouds,  the  rolling  jungle  filled  the  intervening  space  with 
a  foliage  brown,  green,  and  golden,  and  pouring  like  a 
cascade  down  the  sloping  rock  below  our  eyes  was  a 
shimmering  flood  of  flowers  which  hummed  with  the 
scent  of  bees  and  sparkled  with  the  morning  dew.  The 
whole  wide  scene  was  bathed  in  sunshine  and  the  still 
air  was  sweet  with  the  song  of  birds. 

That  the  pure  and  beautiful  if  melancholy  religion 
of  Buddha  should  descend  upon  such  evil  times  and 
become  so  sordid,  shabb}^  and  mean  a  thing  —  even  the 
very  antithesis  of  its  modest  founder  —  is  only  a  con- 
firmation of  the  now  generally  accepted  truth  that  the 
religious  experience  of  a  single  man,  once  formalized  and 
stereotyped  for  the  multitude,  tends  towards  violence, 
insincerity,  and  superstition. 

Life  in  Ceylon  under  the  Buddhist  priesthood  is  not 
an  elevating  subject  for  the  student  of  human  nature. 


332  OTHER  SHEEP 

The  priests  themselves,  divided  into  two  v^arring  sects, 
are  very  often,  very  often  indeed,  men  of  a  perverted 
immorality.  "  We  think  nothing  of  that,"  I  was  told 
even  by  Buddhists.  *'  Priests  are  all  the  same."  "  It 
is  one  thing  or  the  other  with  these  fellows."  And 
when  I  pressed  to  know  whether  the  immorality  of  this 
priesthood  did  not  lead  men  to  question  the  truth  of  the 
religion,  I  was  told  that  it  made  no  difference  at  all. 
"  It  is  the  life  and  teachings  of  Buddha  that  we  follow : 
the  priests  are  of  no  account;  we  do  not  take  any  notice 
of  them.  If  you  see  a  man  bow  down  to  a  priest  in  the 
road  or  the  street,  you  must  always  remember  that  he  is 
paying  homage  to  the  yellow  robe  —  the  symbol  of  Bud- 
dha's holy  life." 

I  learned  that  not  one  man  in  a  thousand  really  gives 
his  thought  to  the  Buddhist's  ultimate  Nirvana.  "  Ab- 
sorption into  Universal  Being,"  I  was  told,  "  is  an  event 
so  remote  and  so  immensely  beyond  the  merits  of  ordi- 
nary men,  that  nobody  is  concerned  about  it  in  the  very 
least.  The  dominant  idea  with  us  is  so  to  live  that  we 
may  secure  a  decent  reincarnation.  That  is  the  religion 
of  Buddha.  A  meritorious  life  leads  to  happiness  at  the 
next  birth;  an  evil  life  leads  to  unhappiness." 

Who  can  say  that  here  is  a  likeness  to  Christianity? 
For  the  heaven  of  Jesus  is  to  be  won  by  the  soul  that 
does  good  because  it  loves  goodness,  and  whose  love  of 
good  springs  from  its  adoration  of  God.  He  gives  men 
a  Spiritual  Father  in  heaven;  He  gives  them  in  Himself 
a  Moral  Ideal  on  earth;  and  He  declares  that  love  of 
God  expressed  by  service  to  men  bestows  upon  the  hu- 
man heart  a  joy  that  cannot  be  taken  away  and  a  peace 
that   passes   understanding.     "  I    am   come,"    He    said. 


BUDDHA-LAND  27,2, 

"  that  they  might  have  Life,  and  that  they  might  have 
it  more  abundantly."  Surrender  your  selfish  isolation, 
your  lonely  particularity,  your  disturbing  ideas  of  what 
is  due  to  you,  and  your  individual  assertion  of  your 
rights;  surrender  all  this,  and  born  again  by  the  revela- 
tion of  God's  Love,  long  for  holiness  with  all  the  strength 
and  power  of  your  soul,  learn  that  holiness  is  service, 
and  you  will  come  to  find  that  in  works  of  mercy  and  in 
deeds  of  love  there  is  a  life  grander,  more  joyful,  more 
satisfying,  and  more  abundant  than  any  dark  and  narrow 
life  of  a  soul  prisoned  in  the  cell  of  its  own  existence. 

Buddhism  is  a  synonym  for  Egoism,  and  not  the 
mere  crude  and  only  half -conscious  egoism  of  the  ma- 
terialist, but  the  concentrated,  intense,  and  wholly  con- 
scious egoism  of  the  soul.  Buddhism  is  I  Myself  think- 
ing of  I  Myself;  Christianity  is  Christ  my  Master  think- 
ing of  Man  my  Brother.  The  one  promises  Annihila- 
tion; the  other  Life. 

In  the  forest  village  which  I  have  just  attempted  to 
describe,  and  afterwards  in  Colombo,  I  met  among  the 
Salvationists  a  remarkable  man  converted  to  Christianity 
from  Buddhism  whose  story  will  better  help  the  reader 
to  realize  the  difference  between  the  two  religions  than 
many  pages  of  disquisition. 

This  person,  Samaraveera  by  name,  is  a  tall,  thin,  ro- 
mantic-looking man  of  some  forty  years  of  age.  He  is 
lighter-coloured  than  most  Singhalese,  has  large  and 
handsome  eyes,  and  small  features;  he  wears  a  mous- 
tache and  on  one  side  of  his  forehead  his  thick  black 
hair  hangs  over  as  far  as  the  eyebrow.  The  high  cheek- 
bones stand  out  like  curves  drawn  with  a  pencil,  the 
cheeks  are  sunken,  the  long  bare  neck,  with  its  prominent 


234  OTHER  SHEEP 

Adam's  apple,  is  so  thin  that  all  the  cords  are  visible. 
The  expression  of  his  face  is  one  of  gentle  sweetness. 
His  voice  is  low  and  modulated.  He  has  the  air  of  a 
scholar  given  up  to  spiritual  devotion.  He  speaks  Eng- 
lish without  the  least  trace  of  a  foreign  accent  and  has  a 
perfect  command  of  idiom  and  vocabulary. 

"  Buddhism,"  he  said  to  me,  "  must  never  be  re- 
garded as  an  original  and  separate  religion.  It  is  Hin- 
duism reformed,  and  is  quite  as  centred  in  Hinduism  as 
Protestantism,  which  is  reformed  Catholicism,  is  cen- 
tred in  Christianity.  The  vital  principle  of  each  re- 
ligion is  the  theory  of  reincarnation;  and  both  postu- 
late Nirvana,  or  absorption  into  the  unconscious  essence 
of  Being,  as  the  final  end  of  a  soul's  existence.  Buddha 
denounced  Hindu  gods,  but  he  spoke  of  one  great  Being, 
and  his  idea  of  this  Being  is  much  the  same  if  not  quite 
the  same  as  .the  philosophic  Hindu's  idea  of  Brahma. 
Buddhist  Kings  have  had  as  many  as  forty  wives;  the 
priests  of  Buddhism  practise  immoralities  which  are 
common  among  the  priests  of  Hinduism.  The  purest 
form  of  Buddhism  is  found  in  Ceylon,  but  although  the 
priests  do  not  marry  here,  as  they  do  in  Japan,  still  it  is 
generally  known  that  they  are  not  virtuous.  There  are 
two  sects  of  Buddhism  in  Ceylon,  the  Siamese  sect,  and 
the  Amarapura  sect.  The  priests  of  the  first  sect  leave 
one  shoulder  bare,  and  represent  the  worldly  and  ma- 
terial side  of  Buddhism;  they  deal  only  with  high-caste 
people  and  consider  themselves  an  aristocracy.  The 
Amarapura  sect  cover  both  shoulders  under  the  yellow 
robe,  are  more  pious,  live  purer  lives,  and  go  among  the 
low-caste  peoples  —  but  with  patronage.  Both  priest- 
hoods exercise  a  tyrannous  power  over  the  people  and 


BUDDHA-LAND  2^^ 

claim  a  spiritual  sovereignty.  In  all  schools  of  Bud- 
dhist thought,  sin  is  condemned  only  as  an  offence 
against  one's  neighbour;  never  as  ^a  barrier  erected  by 
the  soul  itself  against  the  love  of  God. 

"  The  legends  about  Buddha  are  just  as  grotesque  as 
those  about  Hindu  gods.  At  his  birth  he  is  said  to  have 
asserted  his  supremacy  over  all  gods;  fresh  from  his 
mother's  womb  he  walked  seven  steps  towards  north, 
south,  east,  and  west,  and  proclaimed  himself  supreme. 
But  in  truth  Buddha  was  a  man  like  other  men;  he 
never  claimed  divine  origin,  and  never  said  that  he  was 
an  incarnation  of  Siva,  Vishnu,  Brahma,  or  any  other 
god.  He  was  a  good  man  who  saw  the  sin  and  suffering 
of  life  with  pain  and  sympathy,  and  he  sought  to  save 
men  from  sin  and  suft'ering  by  teaching  them  to  crush 
in  their  souls  all  desire  for  existence,  good  or  bad,  happy 
or  miserable. 

"  All  the  books  and  all  the  ceremonies  of  Buddhism 
are  in  Pali,  which  is  high  Singhalese,  a  language  known 
only  to  the  priests.  Buddhism  in  this  respect  is  like 
Roman  Catholicism.  But  the  chief  condemnation  of 
Buddhism  is  its  powerlessness  to  recreate  a  fallen  na- 
ture or  restore  a  broken  life.  It  is  beautiful  and  sweet 
as  an  idea,  as  a  sad  and  poetic  philosophy  of  paganism; 
but  it  is  not  a  religion.  If  it  is  a  religion,  it  is  inade- 
quate to  the  world's  needs,  pitifully  inadequate.  It  is  an 
inefficient  religion  —  therefore  it  cannot  be  true.  What 
is  not  true  is  not  a  religion." 

He  told  me  his  own  story  in  the  following  words :  — 

"  My  parents  were  prominent  Buddhists,  my  father 
being  one  of  the  trustees  of  the  temples  —  that  is  to  say, 
a  manager  and  controller  of  finances,   for  the  priests 


2^6  OTHER  SHEEP 

touch  no  money  themselves.  Every  full-moon  day  I 
used  to  go  with  my  parents  to  the  temple,  and  I  loved  to 
go  because  my  mind  was  filled  with  the  charm  of  Bud- 
dha's teaching.  I  thought  there  could  be  nothing  sweeter 
in  all  the  ideas  of  men  than  Buddha's  noble  teaching 
about  Kindness.  '  There  is  great  virtue  in  Kindness.' 
'  The  greatest  power  is  Kindness.'  '  Kindness  to  man 
and  animal'  I  worshipped  in  common  with  all  Bud- 
dhists, but  very  devotedly  because  my  heart  was  so 
deeply  touched  by  this  doctrine  of  Kindness,  the  Trinity 
of  my  religion  —  Buddha,  his  Teaching,  and  his  Dis- 
ciples. I  thoroughly,  almost  passionately,  believed  the 
beautiful  doctrines,  and  like  other  Buddhists  would  wor- 
ship even  an  immoral  priest  because  he  wore  the  robe 
that  Buddha  wore. 

"  At  an  early  age  I  was  seized  by  an  attack  of  dysen- 
tery which  brought  me  to  death's  door.  My  parents  in 
despair  sent  for  the  priests.  My  father  said  that  if  I 
recovered  he  would  dedicate  me  to  the  priesthood.  The 
priests  came,  erected  a  beautiful  altar  in  my  bedroom, 
filled  it  with  flowers,  and  for  seven  days  and  nights 
chanted  their  invocations.  They  took  the  sacred  string, 
dipped  it  in  holy  water,  rubbed  saffron  on,  and  tied  it 
round  me. 

"  I  recovered,  and  my  father  repented  of  his  vow. 
He  thought  me  clever  and  refused  to  let  me  bury  myself 
in  the  priesthood.  This  w^as  a  most  poignant  distress  to 
me.  I  longed  to  be  a  priest.  All  my  thoughts  and  feel- 
ings and  hopes  and  aspirations  were  set  upon  the  priest- 
hood. But  my  father  withstood  all  my  entreaties,  re- 
mained firm  against  the  disappointment  of  the  priests, 


BUDDHA-LAND  2iy 

and  sent  me  to  the  only  school  in  our  neighbourhood, 
which  happened  to  be  a  Christian  school. 

"  I  must  tell  you  that  even  as  a  boy  I  had  a  very  keen 
sense  of  the  horror  of  sin.  I  felt  it  to  be  atrocious  and 
abominable.  As  I  look  back  now,  I  can  truly  say  that  I 
was  conscious  even  as  a  child  of  the  existence  of  God 
within  me.  And  I  firmly  believe  that  my  horror  of  sin, 
something  far  deeper  than  the  Buddhist  notion  of  an  of- 
fence against  one's  neighbour,  was  created  in  my  heart  by 
the  Holy  Spirit. 

"  Some  of  the  teachers  at  the  school  to  which  I  was 
now  put  endeavoured  to  make  a  Christian  of  me.  I 
did  not  examine  the  Christian  doctrines  or  even  study  the 
life  of  Jesus;  it  was  enough  for  me  that  Christians  killed 
animals.  I  used  to  exclaim,  *  But  Christians  kill  an- 
imals ! '  I  felt  that  to  be  atrocious.  Christians  killed 
birds.  How  cruel,  how  dreadful !  I  hated  Christians ; 
or  at  any  rate  I  despised  them.  I  had  always  been  taught 
to  regard  Christians  as  bad  people.  Converts  to  Chris- 
tianity, I  was  told,  were  mere  office-seekers,  people  who 
wanted  to  become  .officials.  I  had  a  bad  view  of  the 
whole  thing.  One  of  my  uncles  had  a  Bible  which  he 
kept  and  studied  diligently  for  the  purpose  of  contro- 
verting Christians  —  a  work  on  which  he  prided  himself 
and  which  gave  him  a  supreme  pleasure.  Soon  after  I 
went  to  school  he  gave  me  a  Bible  as  a  present,  and  said 
to  me,  *  Don't  you  ever  become  a  Christian.'  I  said,  '  No, 
I  never  will ! ' —  for  I  thought  Christians  the  most  cruel 
and  degraded  people  on  the  earth.  When  I  came  to  read 
the  Bible  I  felt  that  it  was  an  absolute  fairy-story.  The 
whole  thing  seemed  to  be  impossible  and  absurd.     And 


338  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  death  of  Christ  —  a  felon's  death!  I  could  not  get 
over  that.  Buddha  —  the  son  of  a  King!  Oh,  how 
great  the  difference !  That  the  Son  of  God  should  perish 
on  the  cross,  hanged  like  a  criminal  between  two  thieves, 
struck  me  as  a  thing  too  dreadful  to  think  about,  and  too 
unthinkable  to  be  true.  Besides,  there  was  in  the  Bible 
from  beginning  to  end  the  idea  that  God  had  created  the 
world,  a  good  God,  a  perfect  God,  a  God  all-wise,  all- 
knowing,  and  all-powerful.  But  I  knew  that  creation 
was  imperfect.  I  knew  about  sorrow  and  death.  It 
seemed  to  me  as  unthinkable  to  make  a  good  God  the 
creator  of  a  world  so  full  of  cruelty,  misery,  sorrow, 
and  sin  as  to  believe  that  the  Son  of  God  died  on  a 
felon's  cross  between  two  dreadful  thieves. 

"  But  although  my  teachers  at  school  failed  utterly 
to  make  a  Christian  of  me,  they  widened  my  knowledge, 
broadened  my  sympathies,  and  gave  me  a  different  no- 
tion of  Christian  character.  As  I  grew  up  I  felt  more 
and  more  the  conviction  of  sin  in  my  heart,  and  was  con- 
scious of  an  unrest  which  worship  of  Buddha  and  devo- 
tion to  his  Teaching  could  not  allay.  I  was  aware  in 
myself  of  some  inarticulate  longing  for  greater  holiness 
and  deeper  peace,  for  a  more  harmonious  relation  in  my 
soul  to  the  universe  surrounding  me.  I  began  to  realize 
the  beauty  of  Christ's  character  and  to  feel  in  His  Teach- 
ing some  mystical  sweetness  that  ministered  to  the  sad- 
ness and  disquiet  of  my  heart.  I  used  to  read  the  four 
gospels,  and  think  about  a  God  of  Love  —  one  all-em- 
bracing and  merciful  Father  in  heaven  Whose  creation 
had  been  marred  by  man  himself.  Then  I  began  to  feel 
guilty,  terribly  guilty,  and  the  fear  of  dying  in  isolation 
from  God  took  hold  of  me  and  made  me  afraid. 


BUDDHA-LAND  239 

"  The  only  Christians  who  attracted  me  were  the  Sal- 
vationists. I  was  attracted  by  observing  the  self-sacri- 
ficing lives  of  these  people  and  their  intense  earnestness 
and  simplicity.  I  was  already  dimly  aware  that  no  rit- 
ual or  ceremonial,  no  pomp  of  worship  and  no  mere 
acceptance  of  an  idea  or  a  doctrine  could  give  me  the 
peace  of  which  I  was  in  quest.  Quite  dimly,  but  still 
consciously,  I  felt  the  need  for  a  change  of  heart,  a  new- 
birth,  a  complete  revolution  of  being.  I  do  not  know  if 
I  can  make  clear  to  you  what  I  then  felt.  My  thoughts 
were  troubled,  my  heart  was  full  of  unrest,  I  was  con- 
scious of  a  great  loneliness.  I  wanted  Truth.  With  all 
my  mind  and  soul  I  wanted  Truth.  To  be  sure  of 
something  as  absolutely  True  —  this  was  the  hunger  and 
thirst  of  my  whole  being.  And  in  this  drifting  condi- 
tion, half-believing  in  a  God  of  Love,  and  touched  by  the 
beautiful  Teaching  of  Jesus,  I  saw  these  Salvationists  in 
my  neighbourhood,  living  lives  of  extreme  self-sacri- 
fice, avoiding  everything  in  the  nature  of  ceremonial  or 
formalism,  and  preaching  the  religion  of  Jesus  v/ith  a 
devotion  which  was  perhaps  my  first  knowledge  of  earn- 
estness. 

"  I  felt  I  should  like  to  know  more  about  these  peo- 
ple, and  began  to  attend  their  meetings.  Several  Bud- 
dhists went  out  of  mere  curiosity,  and  my  presence 
attracted  no  attention.  My  people  thought  I  was  far 
too  intellectual  to  become  a  Christian,  and  they  hoped 
that  I  should  one  day  distinguish  myself  either  in  Gov- 
ernment service  or  as  a  professional  man.  The  meet- 
ings had  various  effects  upon  me.  Sometimes  I  was 
deeply  impressed,  sometimes  I  felt  chilled  and  repelled, 
sometimes  I  felt  how  hopeless  it  all  was  —  to  understand 


240  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  Will  of  God  and  discover  the  truth  of  things.  But 
the  wonderful  lives  of  these  people,  and  the  marvellous 
manner  in  which  they  converted  wicked  and  degraded 
men  into  good  and  holy  men,  had  such  an  attraction  for 
me  that  I  could  not  resist  attending  their  meetings. 

"  It  was  at  a  special  gathering  that  my  illumination 
came.  The  European  officer  made  this  meeting  the  oc- 
casion for  a  great  searching  of  the  heart,  for  a  pitiless 
cross-examination  of  the  conscience.  As  the  meeting 
proceeded  I  felt  myself  the  victim  of  a  terrible  despair. 
I  was  a  sinner  condemned  and  lost.  Of  myself  I  could 
do  nothing.  For  ever  I  might  struggle  and  strive,  but 
it  would  always  be  the  same  —  unhappiness  of  heart, 
doubt  of  mind,  and  wretchedness  of  soul.  There  was 
no  light  in  myself  to  pierce  the  darkness  crowding  upon 
me  from  every  point  of  the  universe.  There  was  no  con- 
ceivable action  possible  to  me  which  could  make  me  at 
peace  with  the  mystery  of  things.  I  was  in  darkness,  and 
I  was  in  ignorance.  To  die  as  I  was  —  a  stranger  to 
God,  a  soul  seeking  of  itself  to  establish  peace  with  God 
—  this  would  be  terrible. 

"  I  was  a  sinner,  and  to  sinners  Jesus  had  said,  Come 
unto  Me.  I  felt  that  Jesus  had  power.  I  could  see  no 
other  way  of  escape  and  deliverance  but  by  Jesus. 

"  What  was  I  at  the  moment  ?  A  soul  arrested  by  the 
great  central  idea  of  Right  and  Wrong.  To  be  cleansed 
from  sin,  to  be  purged  of  misery,  to  feel  myself  standing 
on  a  rock  secure  in  strength  greater  than  my  own  and 
fixed  in  a  holiness  infinitely  higher  than  my  own  —  this 
was  my  longing.  And  to  whom  could  I  go  ?  —  of  all  the 
Teachers  and  Philosophers  in  history,  to  whom  could  I 
go?     To  none,  save  Jesus.     He  alone  teaches  how  the 


BUDDHA-LAND  24I 

heart  may  be  cleansed,  how  the  soul  may  be  born  again, 
how  the  spirit  can  rest  like  a  little  child  in  the  Love  of 
God.  But —  The  ordeal!  I  cannot  tell  you  how  I 
shrank  from  it.  My  struggle  for  new-birth,  my  longing 
for  conversion,  all  the  turmoil  of  my  soul  for  some  new 
and  wonderful  thing  to  happen  to  me,  was  spiritual. 
And  a  physical  act  was  required!  In  that  moment  of 
shrinking  and  recoil,  as  if  he  were  an  angel  sent  by  God 
direct  from  the  sky,  a  Salvationist  came  to  me  and  helped 
me  to  decide.  I  rose  from  my  seat  and  went  forward 
before  the  people.  I  surrendered  myself  in  that  moment 
to  God.  I  knelt  trembling,  a  raw  heathen  full  of  dark- 
ness, and  opened  my  heart  and  uttered  a  prayer  for  the 
first  time  in  my  life.  I  rose  a  new  man.  I  rose  to  a 
new  world,  for  a  new  purpose;  and  twenty-one  years 
have  gone,  by  since  that  night,  so  memorable  and  so 
wonderful  to  me,  twenty-one  years  of  hard  work,  un- 
broken consolation  and  deepening  joy.  At  the  moment 
of  my  conversion  I  felt  at  rest,  suddenly  at  rest;  I  was 
conscious  of  a  delirious  sense  of  victory  after  the  severe 
struggle,  and  happy  —  happy  with  a  strange  irradiation 
of  light  pervading  all  my  soul,  and  the  feeling  of  a  hope 
that  supported  me  and  lifted  me  up." 

This  man  for  twenty-one  years  has  been  a  most  de- 
voted Salvationist,  working  for  the  Kingdom  of  God  in 
Ceylon,  a  man  whose  influence  as  a  spiritual  force  is 
acknowledged  both  by  Europeans  and  Natives.  And 
that  such  a  man  and  such  a  body  as  the  Salvation  Army 
is  necessary  to  Ceylon,  let  the  brief  stories  related  in  the 
next  chapter  witness. 


RESTORATION 

There  are  many  streets  in  the  midst  of  Colombo  which 
suggest  the  comfort  and  domesticity  of  an  EngHsh  sub- 
urb. Although  they  are  within  a  few  minutes'  walk  of 
a  sea-front,  brilliant  shop-windows,  factory  chimneys, 
military  barracks.  Government  offices  and  a  Native  quar- 
ter as  Eastern  as  the  Delhi  bazaars,  they  are  so  shut  in 
by  towering  trees  and  so  illuminated  by  their  bird- 
haunted  gardens,  that  one  might  imagine  them  as  far 
from  the  busy  city  as  Sydenham  or  Finchley  from  the 
central  roar  of  London. 

In  one  of  these  quiet  streets  there  is  a  red-bricked 
house  standing  back  from  the  road  which  looks  as  sim- 
ple and  ordinary  as  any  of  its  neighbours.  Nothing 
marks  it  as  a  separate  dwelling.  There  is  no  plate  or 
board  on  either  of  its  drive  gates  or  over  its  porch.  It 
wears  the  same  appearance  of  languorous  calm  and  un- 
eventful domesticity  which  characterizes  every  other 
house  in  the  long  and  somnolent  street.  And  yet  it  is 
a  habitation  of  tragedy  and  sorrow  beyond  the  power 
of  human  language  to  express.     It  is  a  Rescue  Home. 

At  the  back  of  this  house,  under  a  broad  veranda 
where  the  sun's  light  enters  cooled  and  greened  through 
a  hanging  curtain  of  whispering  leaves,  I  found  a  party 
of  Singhalese  girls,  busy  with  needlework  while  an 
elderly  Native  woman  read  to  them  from  a  book. 
Among  these  girls  was  a  little  child,  dressed  in  a  sleeve- 

242 


RESTORATION 


243 


less  white  jacket  and  a  red  and  yellow  skirt,  whose 
extreme  youth  and  face  of  settled  suffering  and  unalter- 
able grief  at  once  moved  my  pity  and  awoke  my  curi- 
osity. She  was  under  twelve  years  of  age.  The  tiny 
face,  shadowed  by  clustering  dark  curls,  was  dull  and 
sorrowful;  there  was  no  brightness  in  the  sullen  eyes, 
no  childhood  in  the  tragic  little  mouth.  Her  neck  was 
so  thin  that  a  child  could  easily  have  spanned  it  with  two 
hands;  her  arms  were  little  more  than  skin  and  bone; 
under  the  linen  of  her  jacket  the  baby  breasts  only  just 
showed,  as  a  cigarette  case  shows  in  a  waistcoat  pocket. 
She  was  a  child,  and  nothing  but  a  child ;  a  child  as  un- 
formed and  immature  as  an  English  girl  of  her  own  age. 
And  she  had  come  to  the  Rescue  Home  from  a  hospital. 

This  is  her  story. 

She  does  not  remember  a  father.  In  rather  sordid 
poverty  but  not  in  actual  misery  she  grew  up  under  the 
care  of  her  mother,  helping  in  the  home  and  playing  in 
the  streets  like  so  many  other  children  in  that  crowded 
quarter  of  the  city.  At  the  age  of  eleven  her  mother 
said  to  her  one  day :  "  I  cannot  afford  to  keep  you  any 
longer ;  I  have  arranged  for  you  to  go  to  work,  you  will 
earn  money  and  the  people  will  give  you  food  and 
clothes." 

That  evening  the  mother  took  her  to  a  native  hotel, 
and  handed  her  over  to  the  man  who  had  bought  her  as 
a  part  of  his  stock-in-trade.  This  hotel  stilt  stands  in 
Sea  Street,  near  the  Fish  Market  —  a  vile  place  in  a 
filthy  alley  of  ugliness  and  iniquity.  The  child  was  too 
frightened  to  cry  out  to  her  mother  not  to  desert  her. 
Although  she  had  no  idea  in  the  world  of  her  true  pur- 
pose in  that  evil  place  she  was  stricken  with  a  paralysing 


244  OTHER  SHEEP 

terror  and  wanted  to  flee  from  the  noisy  house  and  the 
brutal- faced  man  who  looked  her  over  with  scowling 
eyes.  But  she  felt  herself  to  be  powerless,  as  indeed  she 
was,  and  followed  her  master  up  a  flight  of  crazy  stairs 
to  the  upper  floor.  He  opened  the  door  of  a  room,  bade 
her  pass  in,  and  told  her  she  might  go  to  sleep.  She 
woke  in  hell. 

For  six  or  seven  months  she  remained  a  prisoner  in 
this  house.  There  were  three  other  girls  to  share  her 
misery  and  her  degradation.  They  were  fed  on  the 
poorest  rice,  were  given  no  money,  were  made  to  work 
in  the  house,  and  were  constantly  beaten  by  their  mas- 
ter. Not  once  in  all  that  time  was  she  allowed  to  go  out 
of  doors.  Through  the  morning  she  did  the  laborious 
housework;  from  the  afternoon  to  the  small  hours  of 
the  night  she  was  the  victim  of  her  master's  trade.  And 
the  men  who  visited  this  house  were  the  lowest  pariahs 
of  the  place  —  loathsome  and  abominable  coolies, 
drunken  and  diseased  sailors,  the  filth  and  offscourings 
of  a  Native  quarter  in  a  seaport  town. 

Towards  the  end  of  her  imprisonment,  this  child  just 
over  eleven  years  of  age,  was  smitten  by  one  of  the  most 
terrible  diseases  with  which  nature  punishes  an  intem- 
perate animalism.  It  became  so  bad  at  last  that  her 
master  himself  took  her  to  the  hospital,  claimed  to  be 
her  owner,  and  said  he  would  come  back  to  fetch  her 
when  she  was  cured. 

One  of  the  women  doctors  in  this  hospital,  taking  an 
interest  in  the  child,  gradually  got  her  story  from  her, 
and  at  once  sent  to  the  Salvationist  in  charge  of  the 
Rescue  Home.  The  two  women,  both  of  them  practical 
saints  of  the  twentieth  century,  determined  to  save  the 


RESTORATION 


245 


child  body  and  soul.  For  five  weeks  she  received  all 
the  love  and  care  and  science  of  the  hospital,  and  from  the 
hospital  she  passed  to  the  love  and  care  and  science  of 
the  Rescue  Home.  The  man  who  had  bought  her  came 
twice  to  the  hospital  and  demanded  to  have  the  child 
restored  to  him ;  he  had  paid  for  her  arid  she  belonged  to 
him;  he  actually  attempted  to  threaten  the  hospital  with 
proceedings  at  law. 

But  the  child  was  safe  from  this  monster,  and  she 
is  likely  to  remain  safe  for  the  rest  of  her  life.  In  the 
Rescue  Home  she  has  become  the  pet  and  fondling  of 
the  other  girls,  she  is  adored  by  the  officers  in  charge, 
and  slowly  —  very  slowly,  of  course  —  she  is  building  up 
the  shattered  strength  of  her  body  and  the  ruined  fabric 
of  her  mind.  Often  the  poor  little  creature  will  be  found 
weeping  silently  and  secretly;  often  she  will  accuse  her- 
self of  being  slow  and  stupid  at  her  work;  and  some- 
times even  to  the  loving  people  watching  over  her  resto- 
ration with  such  tender  solicitude,  it  seems  as  though 
she  will  never  be  able  to  rid  her  mind  of  its  terrible 
nightmare  of  the  past.  But  one  of  the  Native  Salva- 
tionists, who  is  in  charge  of  the  needlework  class  and 
who  reads  to  the  girls  while  they  are  busy  with  their 
needles,  said  to  me  as  she  caressed  this  little  child  with 
all  the  affection  of  a  mother — "  She  is  praying  and  im- 
proving." 

Among  the  girls  seated  in  the  green  light  of  the  ve- 
randa busy  with  needlework,  was  one  somewhat  older 
than  the  others;  a  handsome  and  capable  young  woman, 
whose  story  I  learned  partly  from  herself  and  partly 
from  the  Native  Salvationist  in  charge  of  the  establish- 
ment. 


246  OTHER  SHEEP 

She  was  a  village  girl,  the  -daughter  of  humble 
peasants,  and,  until  disaster  overtook  her,  had  spent  all 
her  life  in  the  simple  surroundings  of  the  little  mud 
house  which  they  called  their  home.  At  this  time  she 
was  a  tall  and  grace  fully- formed  girl,  past  the  shapeless- 
ness  of  childhood  and  not  yet  a  fully-matured  woman. 

One  day  there  came  to  the  door  of  their  village  house 
a  venerable  old  man  peddling  various  articles  of  the 
household.  As  he  talked  to  the  mother,  he  studied  the 
girl,  and  presently  he  asked  if  the  mother  could  spare 
the  child,  "  for,"  said  he,  "  I  know  of  a  lady  in  Colombo 
who  wants  an  ayah  —  a  fine  house  and  the  wages  are 
fifteen  rupees  a  month." 

To  the  villagers  of  Ceylon,  I  discovered,  the  name  of 
"  Colombo  "  has  the  same  magic  which  Paris  has  for  so 
many  French  provincials.  It  is  to  them  a  fairyland  of 
blinding  splendour  and  inexhaustible  delight.  They  see 
it  as  a  city  of  enchantment,  sparkling  with  myriads  of 
lamps,  ringing  with  music,  and  crowded  from  morning 
to  night  with  men  and  women  dressed  like  Kings  and 
Queens.  Little  village  children  tell  each  other  stories 
about  this  magic  city  of  Colombo;  young  girls  dream 
about  it ;  and  young  men  do  not  rest  until  they  have  been 
there. 

"  When  I  heard  him  say  Colombo,"  the  girl  told  me, 
"  I  felt  so  excited  that  I  could  not  speak.  Oh,  it  seemed 
to  me  too  wonderful  to  be  true !  It  was  more  wonderful 
than  the  fifteen  rupees  a  month,  which  seemed  to  me  like 
a  fortune.  I  had  always  longed  to  see  Colombo,  so  that 
I  had  often  dreamed  about  it,  but  I  never  thought  that 
my  dreams  would  come  true." 

The  mother,  dazzled  by  the  fortune  so  suddenly  pre- 


RESTORATION  247 

sented  to  her  daughter,  parted  with  the  child,  and  that 
very  day,  without  inquiry  of  any  kind,  the  venerable 
pedlar  and  the  young  girl  started  for  Colombo.  They 
reached  the  city  at  night,  and  leaving  the  railway  station, 
made  their  way  into  the  narrow  and  bewildering  streets 
of  Slave  Island.  The  old  man  explained  to  the  wonder- 
ing girl  that  it  was  too  late  to  go  that  night  to  the  lady's 
house,  and  said  that  he  would  take  her  to  a  nice  quiet 
hotel  where  she  could  rest  till  the  morning.  He  stopped 
before  the  door  of  an  evil-looking  house,  and  bidding 
the  girl  wait  for  him,  went  inside  by  himself.  After  a 
few  minutes  he  returned  and  conducted  the  girl  into  the 
interior,  where  he  presented  her  to  the  proprietor.  "  It 
may  be  a  day  or  two  before  I  can  come  back  and  take  you 
to  the  lady's  house,"  he  said,  in  farewell,  "  but  you  must 
wait  here  till  I  come  and  fetch  you."  Then  he  departed, 
never  of  course  to  return. 

After  some  three  or  four  days  the  landlord  came  to 
her  and  asked  if  she  had  money  to  pay  her  bill.  She 
had  nothing.  He  became  angry ;  but,  when  she  cried,  he 
told  her  that  he  would  not  hand  her  over  to  the  police. 
"  You  must  work  to  pay  me  back  for  your  food  and 
lodging,"  he  told  her,  and  she  was  set  to  cook  food  and 
to  scrub  floors. 

There  were  several  women  in  this  house  and  their 
manner  of  living  soon  came  to  the  knowledge  of  the 
country  girl.  They  received  from  their  visitors  presents 
of  cigarettes  and  cigars,  clothes  and  a  little  cheap  jewel- 
lery, but  no  money.  From  each  of  their  visitors  the 
landlord  got  what  he  could  —  any  sum  from  five  rupees 
to  fifteen  —  six  shillings  and  eight-pence  to  a  sovereign. 
For  this,  he  fed  them,  gave  them  lodging,  and  treated 


24S  OTHER  SHEEP 

them  with  a  constant  brutality.  His  house  was  their 
prison,  and  he  was  their  jailer. 

The  country  girl  found  herself  as  completely  a  prisoner 
as  the  others.  She  was  not  allowed  to  leave  the  house, 
and  was  carefully  watched  by  her  master  or  his  hire- 
lings when  her  work  took  her  near  the  door  or  the  win- 
dows overlooking  the  street.  For  three  days  she  was 
driven  and  harried  at  this  housework  till  her  body  was 
fatigued  to  the  point  of  exhaustion  and  her  heart  almost 
broken  by  despair.  On  the  night  of  the  third  day  she 
became  like  the  other  girls  in  the  house. 

She  remained  a  prisoner  for  a  whole  year,  her  one 
attempt  to  escape  being  easily  frustrated  and  most  cru- 
elly punished.  At  the  end  of  this  time  she  was  obliged 
to  go  into  the  Lock  Hospital,  suffering  from  the  same 
disease  as  the  child  in  the  last  story. 

She  responded  at  once  to  the  kindness  of  doctors  and 
nurses,  and  showed  a  most  intelligent  interest  in  the 
ministrations  of  the  Salvationists.  She  said  to  them,  "  I 
do  not  understand  all  you  tell  me,  but  I  want  to  be  good ; 
if  you  will  let  me,  I  should  like  to  go  into  your  home." 
Every  Thursday  a  Salvationist  paid  her  a  visit,  and 
gradually  the  poor  unhappy  creature  came  into  the  sooth- 
ing and  re-creating  atmosphere  of  religion.  Towards  the 
end  of  her  period  in  hospital,  a  woman  from  the  brothel 
came  to  see  her.  She  sprang  out  of  bed  at  sight  of  this 
visitor,  rushed  to  the  bathroom,  and  locked  herself  in. 
When  they  were  able  to  assure  her  of  protection  and 
she  was  induced  to  open  the  door,  she  told  them  that  she 
would  a  thousand  times  rather  die  in  the  hospital  than 
go  back  to  the  brothel.  They  promised  to  save  her  from 
the  clutches  of  her  tyrants,  and  in  a  few  weeks'  time  she 


RESTORATION  249 

was  taken  to  the  Home.  Nearly  four  years  have  passed 
since  that  day.  She  is  now  one  of  the  most  enthusiastic 
workers  for  her  suffering  sisters,  and  every  other  Sun- 
day pays  a  visit  either  to  the  Lock  Hospital  or  the  Jail 
with  the  message  of  Christianity.  In  the  Rescue  Home 
she  is  like  an  angel  to  the  other  girls,  and  is  entrusted 
with  work,  and  helps  them  to  forget  the  haunting  con- 
tagion of  their  past  lives. 

She  told  me  that  the  majority  of  bad  women  in  Ceylon 
are  without  shame,  and  manifest  no  longing  to  be  good. 
The  Eurasian  women  are  the  worst.  Many  of  the 
brothels  are  kept  by  German  women,  who  employ  agents 
all  over  the  island  to  get  them  children  of  twelve  years 
of  age.  The  police  of  Ceylon  constantly  come  to  the 
Salvation  Army  with  girls  who  have  been  ruined  by 
these  procuresses. 

Another  story  shows  another  aspect  of  this  rescue 
work.  A  Singhalese  Christian  girl,  twenty-nine  years  of 
age,  charming  in  manner,  and  pleasant  to  look  upon,  is 
the  sad  heroine  of  this  different  tale.  During  an  ab- 
sence of  her  parents  from  home,  she  became  as  weak  as 
water  in  the  hands  of  a  philandering  cousin,  and  finally 
yielded  to  him.  For  nearly  four  months  she  hid  her 
secret,  and  then  it  was  discovered  by  her  mother.  In  a 
few  minutes  the  house  was  in  an  uproar.  The  mother 
stormed  at  her,  the  father  beat  her  without  mercy,  and 
finally  she  was  thrown  out  of  the  house  and  told  never 
again  to  darken  its  door. 

The  miserable  girl  wandered  away  to  the  houses  of 
relations,  but  in  every  case  met  with  scorn  and  derision. 
No  one  would  take  her  in.  Everybody  upbraided  her. 
At  last,  in  despair,  she  made  her  way  from  the  villages 


250  OTHER  SHEEP 

into  the  jungle,  and  there  for  a  whole  week  wandered 
aimlessly  to  and  fro,  broken-hearted,  terrified,  starving, 
and  despairing.  It  seemed  to  her  that  all  the  world  was 
against  her,  that  nowhere  under  heaven  was  there  pity 
for  her  condition.  But  she  was  young,  she  was  strong, 
and  the  passion  to  live  was  vigorous  in  her  blood.  Hun- 
ger drove  her  out  from  the  jungle,  and  she  set  her  face 
towards  a  village.  She  was  now  thin,  ragged,  and  wild- 
looking.  Children  eyed  her  askance,  women  watched 
her  with  suspicion,  some  of  the  men  mocked  her.  How- 
ever here  and  there  she  found  a  person  to  give  her  a 
little  handful  of  rice,  and  at  night  she  would  lie  down 
and  sleep  in  the  shadow  of  a  friendly  doorway.  It  was 
better  than  the  jungle. 

Her  condition  w^as  soon  obvious  to  all  the  world. 
Instead  of  creating  pity  in  the  heart  of  humanity  it  only 
intensified  mocking  and  scorn.  She  was  no  longer  a 
woman,  she  was  a  pariah  dog.  They  hunted  her  away 
from  their  doors  with  bitter  words  and  wounding  taunts. 
Now  and  then  food  was  given  to  her,  but  never  a  kind 
word.  It  was  "  Take  and  begone  "  from  village  to  vil- 
lage, till  she  felt  herself  hated  and  loathed  by  all  man- 
kind. 

At  last  she  encountered  something  in  the  nature  of 
kindness.  A  woman  at  whose  door  she  had  begged  a 
little  rice,  said  to  her :  "  You  should  go  to  Colombo. 
There  are  some  Christians  down  there  who  call  them- 
selves Salvationists  and  who  look  after  people  like  you. 
They  will  take  you  into  one  of  their  houses.  You  had 
better  go  to  them  at  once.     It  will  soon  be  too  late." 

With  this  crumb  of  comfort  for  her  despairing  soul, 
the  miserable  girl  tramped  all  the  way  with  her  grievous 


RESTORATION  251 

burden  to  Colombo,  and  asked  for  the  Salvation  Army. 
In  a  few  minutes  the  whole  aspect  of  her  life  was 
changed.  From  being  a  pariah  she  found  herself  treated 
with  the  most  endearing  kindness  and  stimulated  by 
words  of  strong  and  bracing  encouragement.  They  car- 
ried her  to  the  hospital,  and  when  her  baby  was  born,  it 
was  adopted  by  one  of  the  Salvationists.  She  entered 
the  Rescue  Home  for  a  week,  and  when  her  strength  was 
recovered,  she  set  out  to  return  to  her  home. 

Now  that  she  was  no  longer  a  scandal,  now  that  the 
child  was  born  and  taken  from  her,  she  hoped  that  her 
parents  would  receive  her  with  love  and  let  her  be  as  one 
of  the  other  children.  But  no  sooner  had  she  entered 
her  home  than  they  flew  at  her  with  reproaches.  They 
brought  back  the  past,  they  struck  her  across  the  face 
with  their  hands,  and  they  called  her  wasa-ganya  —  the 
word  that  stings  a  pure  woman.  It  was  impossible  for 
her  to  stay.  Very  sorrowfully,  with  tears  in  her  eyes 
and  a  most  bitter  agony  in  her  heart,  the  unhappy  crea- 
ture turned  away  from  her  home,  and  homeless,  parent- 
less,  friendless,  once  more  an  outcast  on  the  face  of  the 
earth,  went  out  into  the  world  which  is  so  cruel  to  all 
and  so  perilous  for  lonely  women.  But  this  time  she 
knew  that  there  was  one  place  where  doors  would  be 
open  to  her,  where  a  kind  welcome  would  greet  her,  and 
where  she  might  live  as  a  human  being. 

It  is  now  over  six  years  since  she  returned  to  the  Res- 
cue Home  in  Ceylon,  and  all  those  years  have  been 
marked  by  a  wonderful  deepening  of  her  spiritual  life. 
She  was  described  to  me  as  "  admirable  " —  a  girl  who 
was  always  happy,  always  kind  to  others,  always  ener- 
getic at  her  work,  and  always  grateful  to  those  who  be- 


'252  OTHER  SHEEP 

friended  her.  But  for  the  Salvationists,  but  for  that 
always  open  door  of  the  Salvation  Army,  she  must  have 
ended  her  life  in  the  horror  and  ruin  of  depravity.  *'  Her 
father  and  mother,"  I  v^as  told,  "  are  grateful  now,  are 
sorry  for  what  they  did  in  the  past,  and  always  give  her 
a  kind  welcome  when  she  goes  to  see  them." 

Other  stories  I  heard  in  the  Rescue  Home,  equally 
tragic,  equally  hopeful,  and  equally  illuminating;  but 
these  three  are  perhaps  sufficient  to  give  the  reader  an 
idea  of  the  need  for  a  real  and  saving  religion  in  the 
island  of  Ceylon.  Buddhism  does  absolutely  nothing  for 
the  fallen,  and  has  little  strength  for  the  falling.  The 
climate  of  the  island,  the  presence  of  a  large  number  of 
young  unmarried  European  men,  the  lightness  and  the 
flippancy  with  which  purity  is  everywhere  apt  to  be  re- 
garded in  an  age  of  perishing  superstition  and  triumph- 
ing materialism,  make  it  essential  for  the  health  of  the 
Singhalese  people,  and  in  particular  for  the  happiness  of 
Singhalese  girls,  that  religion  in  its  high  aspect  of  a 
noble  morality  should  be  constantly  in  evidence  through- 
out the  length  and  breadth  of  Ceylon. 

If  I  may  venture  to  express  an  opinion  on  the  difficult 
question  of  government  —  I  would  say  that  more  power 
should  be  given  to  the  police  to  visit  the  innumerable 
brothels  of  the  big  towns,  that  the  work  of  the  native 
procurer  and  the  German  procuress  should  be  brought  to 
.a  stop,  and  that  the  severest  punishment  allowed  by  the 
law  should  be  meted  out  to  any  man  or  any  woman  who 
is  keeping  children  against  their  will  in  houses  of  immo- 
rality. It  is  not  easy  to  make  war  on  vice,  but  to  make 
no  war  at  all  is  to  be  guilty  of  a  crime. 


THE  BHILS 

The  more  clearly  we  come  to  see  that  civilized  man  is 
not  a  fallen  angel  but  an  ascending  creature  of  barbaric 
ancestry,  the  more  interested  we  are  likely  to  become  in 
those  races  of  the  earth  who  still  preserve  for  us  in  their 
manners,  customs,  and  superstitions  the  earliest  chapters 
in  the  history  of  our  strange  and  eventful  progress. 

It  is  intelligible  enough  that  a  gentleman  in  England 
should  wish  to  know  about  his  great-great-grandfather, 
or  that  a  lady  in  Rome  should  spend  a  considerable  part 
of  her  life  in  convincing  the  little  group  of  her  acquaint- 
ance that  one  of  her  ancestors  was  a  nobleman.  But 
such  archaeology  is  but  the  toying  of  the  nursery  in  com- 
parison with  that  larger  interest  in  our  antiquity  which 
carries  the  mind  back  to  the  very  beginning  of  human 
emergences.  For  there  is  not  a  single  custom  or  man- 
ner or  superstition  of  primitive  peoples  which  does  not 
hold  a  taper  to  the  darkness  and  mystery  of  our  own 
complex  society  and  our  own  individual  region  of  per- 
plexing consciousness.  The  most  modern  European 
may  find  in  the  habits  of  a  single  aboriginal  tribe  still 
inhabiting  the  world  and  still  living  the  entirely  ignorant 
and  absolutely  superstitious  life  which  preceded  the  rise 
of  the  Pharaohs  and  the  birth  of  Greek  philosophy,  an 
explanation  of  strange  stirrings  and  dim  motions  which 
haunt  the  chambers  of  his  brain  and  trouble  his  soul 
with  an  inexplicable  persistence. 

253 


254  OTHER  SHEEP 

The  vast  continent  of  India  is  a  monument  to  the  ever- 
lastingness  of  superstition.  From  the  most  refined  and 
philosophic  Brahman  down  to  the  most  degraded  Un- 
touchable, this  immense  congeries  of  humanity,  this  fifth 
of  the  entire  human  race,  is  governed  from  birth  to  death 
by  a  wand  of  superstition  to  which  the  rod  of  Nero  or 
the  scourge  of  the  Inquisition  was  but  as  a  snapping 
twitch.  And  among  these  various  peoples  of  India,  but 
separated  from  them  as  utterly  as  the  sand  of  the  Plains 
from  the  waves  of  the  Indian  Ocean,  there  are  tribes  and 
races  of  mankind  still  more  ignorant,  still  more  super- 
stitious, and  still  more  primitive,  who  have  never  been 
absorbed  by  the  comparatively  advanced  civilization  of 
Hinduism  and  who  preserve  for  us  in  all  the  freshness 
and  vivid  power  of  actual  life  the  most  barbarous  man- 
ners and  the  most  savage  superstitions  of  remotest 
antiquity. 

In  certain  districts  of  India  these  strange  and  separate 
peoples  are  termed  "  Criminal  Tribes  " ;  in  others  they 
are  merely  docketed  as  aborigines.  For  the  most  part 
they  live  the  nomadic  life  of  gypsies,  and  get  their  liv- 
ing by  bow  and  arrow,  by  fish-hook,  by  spear,  by  intimi- 
dation, and  by  stealing.  They  have  been  from  the  earli- 
est times  of  the  British  occupation  a  thorn  in  the  side  of 
Government,  and  a  costly  thorn  in  particular  to  the  es- 
timates of  those  provinces  in  which  they  live  and  main- 
tain a  stubborn  resistance  to  honest  work  and  the  morality 
of  the  Ten  Commandments.  "  It  is  men  of  this  class," 
says  Sir  Bamfylde  Fuller,  "  who  are  said  to  be  able  to 
steal  a  man's  bedclothes  off  him.  The  tribes  are  kept 
under  close  supervision,  and  efforts  are  made  to  reclaim 


THE  BHILS  255 

them,  but  without  much  success.  The  best  use  that  can 
be  made  of  men  of  this  class  is  to  enHst  them  as  village 
watchmen.  They  are,  as  a  rule,  faithful  to  their  salt, 
and  they  are  exceedingly  skilful  detectives.  They  will 
trace  a  stolen  bullock  by  its  footprints  for  miles  across 
country."  He  tells  a  story  which  will  help  the  reader  to 
realize  the  marvellous  genius  of  these  simple  and  igno- 
rant people  in  the  province  of  crime :  — 

An  acquaintance  of  mine,  who  had  lived  for  some 
time  in  the  cantonments  of  Cawnpore,  shifted  his  res- 
idence to  the  civil  station,  a  mile  or  two  distant, 
and  amongst  his  other  servants  took  his  watchman 
with  him.  A  few  days  later,  he  received  an  anony- 
mous letter  pointing  out  that  the  watchmen  of  the 
cantonment  were  not  of  the  same  community  as  those 
of  the  civil  station,  and  advising  him  to  engage  a  new 
man.  He  thought  little  of  it,  so  it  was  decided  to  use 
a  more  forceful  argument.  It  was  the  hot  weather, 
and,  as  usual,  he  slept  out  of  doors.  Waking  one 
morning,  he  was  amazed  to  see  all  his  drawing-room 
pictures  swinging  from  the  branches  of  the  tree  above 
him :  within  the  bungalow  a  party  of  "  ragging  "  un- 
dergraduates might  have  been  enjoying  themselves: 
the  furniture  was  turned  upside  down.  His  bureau 
stood  wide  open.  Money  had  not  been  touched,  but 
his  stock  of  postage-stamps  had  been  taken,  and  was 
neatly  disposed  around  the  edge  of  the  lawn,  on  each 
stamp  a  pebble,  so  that  it  might  not  be  blown  away. 
He  made  no  more  ado  about  changing  his  watchman. 
(Studies  of  Indian  Life  and  Sentiment,  p.  284.) 


256  OTHER  SHEEP 

Sir  Edmund  Cox  has  lately  told  in  his  book,  Police 
and  Crime  in  India,  a  story  which  shows  how  the  extraor- 
dinary ingenuity  of  the  Indian  criminal  is  combined  with 
a  most  reckless  contempt  of  human  life. 

A  party  of  thieves  one  night  broke  into  the  house 
of  a  banker  named  Girwar  Prasad,  They  effected 
their  entrance  by  digging  a  hole  through  one  of  the 
outer  walls  with  a  short,  sharp-pointed  iron  bar.  The 
thieves  had  collected  their  plunder  and  were  departing, 
when  Girwar  Prasad  awoke,  heard  a  noise,  and  ran 
down.  He  entered  the  room  just  in  time  to  see  the 
last  of  the  thieves  crawling  out  through  the  hole;  his 
legs  were  still  inside.  With  great  presence  of  mind 
the  banker  ran  forward  and  forced  himself  between 
them.  The  thief  was  now  caught.  With  his  legs 
separated  he  could  not  get  out,  and  with  his  arms  and 
shoulders  beyond  the  wall,  neither  could  he  force  him- 
self back. 

Girwar  Prasad  summoned  his  servants  and  sent  for 
the  police.  Meanwhile  he  remained  exultant ;  through 
this  thief  the  rest  would  be  apprehended,  and  his  prop- 
erty recovered.  But  in  this  he  was  disappointed.  So 
soon  as  the  other  thieves  found  that  their  comrade  was 
fixed  in  the  hole  they  took  measures  to  prevent  his  be- 
traying them.  They  drew  their  swords,  cut  off  his 
head,  and  carried  it  off  together  with  their  plunder. 
The  police,  on  their  arrival,  found  only  a  bleeding 
neck  protruding  from  the  hole,  and  a  body  that  no 
one  could  identify. 

How  barbarous  some  of  these  people  are  may  be  gath- 
ered from  such  information  as  Sir  Bamfylde  Fuller  gives 


THE  BHILS  257 

of  the  head-hunting  Nagas.  "  No  man,"  he  says,  "  can 
expect  a  nice  girl  to  marry  him  unless  he  can  show  her 
a  ghastly  trophy;  and,  so  brutalized  are  human  feelings, 
that  heads  of  women  and  even  of  little  children  count 
for  as  much  as  the  head  of  a  warrior;  indeed,  they  count 
for  more,  as  to  kill  a  w^oman  or  child  a  man  has  to  ven- 
ture himself  well  inside  the  land  of  the  hostile  village." 
Then  there  are  the  Aghoris  who  are  actually  said  to  eat 
human  bodies :  — 

I  came  across  one  of  them  who  lived  on  a  sand- 
bank in  the  Ganges,  and  arrested  the  corpses  which 
floated  down-stream.  Carrying  a  human  skull,  they 
blackmail  shopkeepers  by  threatening  to  throw  it  upon 
their  stalls,  and  to  pollute  irretrievably  their  stock-in- 
trade.  .  .  .  There  are  actually  ten  thousand  per- 
sons who  at  Census  time  classed  themselves  as  Aghoris. 
All  of  them  do  not  practise  cannibalism,  and  some  of 
them  attempt  to  rise  in  the  world.  One  of  them  se- 
cured service  as  cook  with  a  British  officer  of  my  ac- 
quaintance. My  friend  was  in  camp  in  the  jungle 
with  his  wife  and  children,  when  his  other  servants 
came  to  him  in  a  body  and  refused  to  remain  in  serv- 
ice unless  the  cook  was  dismissed,  since  they  had  dis- 
covered, they  declared,  that  during  the  night  time  he 
visited  cemeteries  and  dug  up  the  bodies  of  freshly 
buried  children.  (Studies  of  Indian  Life  and  Senti- 
ment, pp.  44.  45.) 

Now,  among  all  these  various  peoples  of  India  who 
are  reckoned  as  something  worse  than  untouchable  by 
the  orthodox  Hindu,  there   are  tribes   here  and   there 


258  OTHER  SHEEP 

whose  superstitions  are  gross  but  not  abominable,  and 
whose  criminal  instincts  do  not  greatly  exceed  the  rather 
poetic  pillaging  of  the  English  poacher.  These  tribes, 
while  they  rank  above  the  cannibals  and  head-hunters  of 
other  districts,  retain  all  the  most  primitive  customs  and 
superstitions  of  antiquity,  and  at  the  same  time  manifest 
a  certain  inclination  towards  the  English  influence.  Such 
a  people,  for  instance,  are  the  Doms,  the  Haburas  and 
the  Bhils,  among  whom,  thanks  very  largely  to  the  cour- 
age and  sagacity  of  the  greatest  British  statesman  now 
in  India,  the  Salvation  Anny  is  beginning  a  work  of 
remarkable  promise  for  civilization.  Centuries  of  un- 
speakable tyranny,  and  many  years  of  an  iron  supervision 
by  the  police,  have  made  these  people  sullen  and  suspi- 
cious; but  one  cannot  go  amongst  them  in  their  settle- 
ments and  villages,  or  visit  them  in  the  prisons  where 
so  many  of  them  are  incarcerated,  without  feeling  that 
the  Salvationists  have  set  their  hands  to  a  work  of  the 
most  romantic  character  and  that  here,  perhaps,  more 
than  in  any  other  quarter  of  the  world  a  student  of  hu- 
man nature  may  actually  stand  and  watch  the  rise  of 
the  soul  from  the  very  depths  of  animalism  to  the  faint 
beginnings  of  spiritual  existence. 

The  Bhils  are  said  by  the  Encydopcedia  Britannica  to 
be  "  the  remnants  of  a  Mongolian  race  which  first  dis- 
placed a  yet  earlier  Negroid  population,  and  was  then 
itself  shouldered  out  by  a  Caucasian  irruption."  These 
people  living  shoulder  by  shoulder  with  the  most  ad- 
vanced civilization  of  modern  times,  bear  in  their  patient 
faces  all  the  marks  of  this  immemorial  antiquity.  They 
have  the  worn  and  weary  look  of  travellers  who  have 
come  a  long  journey,  and  on  that  journey  have  seen  such 


THE  BHILS  259 

sights  and  experienced  such  adventures  as  have  destroyed 
in  their  souls  for  evermore  the  faculty  of  wonder.  They 
are  a  tired,  a  quiet,  and  a  conservative  people.  Although 
under  the  influence  of  the  British  power  they  have 
ceased  to  be  marauders,  they  still  cling  to  their  bow  and 
arrows;  and  although  they  have  adopted  from  the  Hin- 
dus the  practice  of  burning  dead  bodies,  they  still  keep 
a  link  with  their  past  by  burying  the  dead  bodies  of 
women. ^  Peaceful  cultivators  of  the  soil  and  good  sol- 
diers, they  remain  as  primitive  and  as  separate  and  as 
superstitious  as  those  far-off  ancestors  who  poured  into 
India  before  the  dawn  of  history  and  drove  the  horde 
of  savage  negroes  into  the  distant  south. 

A  story  of  their  courage  and  endurance  was  told  to 
me  by  a  Salvationist  doctor.  The  rivers  are  infested 
with  turtles,  and  sometimes  a  crocodile  makes  his  ap- 
pearance; when  a  half-cooked  corpse  is  taken  from  the 
fire  and  flung  into  the  river,  the  turtles  swarm  round  it 
and  begin  to  eat,  until  with  a  smashing  sound  like  a 
crack  of  thunder  a  crocodile's  tail  scatters  the  turtles 
and  the  crocodile  takes  possession  of  the  corpse.  An 
unfortunate  Bhil  on  one  occasion  was  grabbed  by  a  croc- 
odile, the  sharp  teeth  locking  in  the  man's  leg.  Before 
he  could  be  dragged  away,  four  of  his  friends  seized  him, 

1  This  fact  I  learn  from  the  Encyclopaedia  Britannica;  but  I  was 
told  by  a  European  who  has  lived  with  the  Bhils  for  something  like 
a  quarter  of  a  century  that  burying  is  only  resorted  to  when  there 
is  not  sufficient  wood  for  burning.  I  was  not  then  aware  of  the 
information  contained  in  the  Encyclopczdia  Britannica,  and  did 
not  ask  whether  any  difference  is  made  between  the  dead  bodies  01 
men  and  women.  Mr.  Edgar  Thurston  tells  me  that  women,  being 
of  small  account,  are  generally  buried  instead  of  burned,  to  avoid 
trouble  and  expense. 


26o  OTHER  SHEEP 

and  then  began  a  tug-of-war  which  resulted  in  a  victory 
for  humanity.  The  man,  with  his  leg  torn  and  lacerated 
beyond  description,  was  brought  fifteen  miles  in  a  burn- 
ing sun  to  the  Salvation  Hospital,  and  underwent  am- 
putation without  a  murmur.  The  doctor  was  then 
implored  to  return  with  his  rifle  and  shoot  the  crocodile. 
The  wailing  of  women,  counterfeiting  a  funeral,  at- 
tracted the  crocodile.  He  raised  his  head  from  the  water 
and  the  doctor  shot  him.  A  tremendous  festival  of  joy 
celebrated  this  event;  and  the  man  recovered. 

I  learned  from  contact  with  these  people  that  they  be- 
lieve in  no  god,  but  that  the  crops  induce  them  to  bestow 
upon  the  earth  the  title  of  a  goddess  —  Mata,  or  Mother 
Earth.  Although  they  may  fairly  be  described  as  athe- 
ists they  are  yet  firmly  convinced  of  the  soul's  persistence 
after  death,  and  hold  in  common  with  nearly  all  savage 
and  primitive  peoples  the  doctrine  of  reincarnation. 
They  believe  that  the  soul  goes  somewhere  after  death, 
and  has  the  power  to  return  and  afflict  the  living.  Par- 
ticularly do  they  fear  the  returning  spirits  of  a  father-in- 
law  or  a  mother-in-law.  Devil-dancers,  who  enjoy 
great  respect  among  these  people,  are  more  often  called 
upon  to  exorcise  the  incarnating  spirits  of  these  two 
relations,  who  so  frequently  figure  in  the  comic  drolleries 
of  more  civilized  people,  than  any  other  spirits,  except  an 
extremely  malignant  female  devil,  named  Dakan. 
Should  a  person  fall  sick,  and  the  devil-dancer  fail  to  get 
rid  of  Dakan,  who  has  caused  the  illness,  a  Bhil  family 
will  move  their  hut  —  perhaps  a  whole  village  will  move 
—  in  order  to  escape  the  haunting  spirit.  Death  itself  is 
attributed  to  this  devil.  A  person  would  never  die  but 
for  the  enmity  of  Dakan.     Some  spirit  of  good  is  sup- 


THE  BHILS  361 

posed  to  preside  over  human  life,  probably  Mata,  the 
Earth  Mother,  and  when  a  person  dies  the  Bhil  says  that 
the  devil  has  triumphed  over  this  good  spirit. 

They  are  far  from  being  vegetarians.  They  not  only 
eat  flesh  food,  even  the  flesh  of  lizards,  but  they  cheer- 
fully consume  the  dead  body  of  any  animal  found  in  the 
jungle.  They  have  no  scruples  on  this  head  and  hold 
that  a  man  is  free  to  take,  kill,  and  eat  anything  that  he 
finds  pleasant  to  the  taste  and  nourishing  to  his  physical 
vigour. 

Custom  allows  each  man  as  many  wives  as  he  is  fool 
enough  to  saddle  himself  with,  but  in  practice  one  man 
finds  one  wife  comfort  enough.  Girls  marry  when  they 
are  about  eighteen  years  of  age,  and  young  men  at  twenty 
or  twenty-four.  The  marriage  ceremony  is  one  of  high 
importance.  The  bridegroom  in  his  home  and  the  bride 
in  hers  colour  themselves  saffron,  not  only  on  the  legs 
and  feet,  and  face  and  hands,  but  all  over  their  gar- 
ments. For  seven  or  ten  nights  each  household  keeps 
music  going  from  sunset  to  midnight  —  the  bride  sitting 
sideways  on  the  shoulder  of  a  young  man,  one  leg  over 
his  chest  and  one  over  his  back,  and  the  bridegroom 
actually  performing  the  same  gymnastic  on  the  shoulder 
of  one  of  the  girls  who  is  a  guest  in  his  house.  As  a  con- 
clusion to  this  junketing,  the  relations  and  invited  guests 
bring  presents  of  money  —  the  union  of  a  man  and 
woman  always  being  considered  an  occasion  for  co-op- 
eration among  relatives  and  their  more  intimate  friends. 
On  the  following  day  the  bridegroom  is  brought  with 
music  to  the  bride's  house,  carrying  money  in  his  hand 
for  the  bride's  father.  A  sham  quarrel  immediately 
takes  place.     The  father  of  the  bride  says  that  the  money 


262  OTHER  SHEEP 

is  not  sufficient;  the  bridegroom  swears  that  it  is  a  deal 
too  much;  voices  rise  to  the  pitch  of  clamour,  language 
becomes  orientally  florid,  and  just  when  it  seems  that 
skulls  must  be  cracked  and  faces  scratched,  the  friends 
of  the  bridegroom  carry  him  off  some  two  or  three  fields 
away.  Here  they  remain,  discussing  how  well  or  how 
ill  the  scene  has  been  acted,  until  the  male  relations  of 
the  bride  arrive  in  force  to  carry  him  back,  after  a  pre- 
tence of  conflict.  Arrived  in  the  bride's  house,  the  head- 
man of  the  village,  or  the  oldest  relation  places  a  little 
raw  sugar  in  the  mouths  of  the  bridegroom  and  bride, 
joins  their  hands  together,  and  in  the  same  breath  that 
he  declares  them  man  and  wife  demands  his  fee  of  one 
rupee.  The  young  men  now  seize  the  newly-married 
wife  and  carry  her  off  to  the  bridegroom's  house,  where 
they  feast  together;  then  they  carry  her  back  to  the 
house  of  her  parents,  and  depart  with  joy.  At  any  mo- 
ment after  this  transaction,  the  bridegroom  is  free  to  go 
and  fetch  his  wife  —  but  he  is  expected  to  bring  presents 
for  her  family. 

In  the  case  of  a  poor  man,  they  have  to  resort  to  the 
Biblical  expedient  of  working  seven  years  for  the  bride 
as  a  servant  of  her  father :  but  during  these  seven  years 
the  bridegroom  cohabits  with  his  wife,  and  a  man  often 
has  five  cheerful  children  when  he  goes  out  from  the 
house  of  his  father-in-law,  a  free  man  and^^t  last  a  mar- 
ried man.  There  is  also  another  arrangement,  a  third 
marriage  system :  a  man  will  pay  down  five  or  ten  rupees 
for  his  wife,  on  the  undertaking  of  her  parents  that  this 
sum  of  money  (6s.  Sd.  or  13^.  4d.)  shall  be  faithfully 
returned  if  the  lady  should  prove  unsuitable;  or  it  may 


THE  BHILS  263 

be  that  the  sum  of  money  is  paid  every  year,  like  the  rent 
of  a  house  or  the  hire  of  a  piano. 

There  are  said  to  be  some  three  millions  of  these  peo- 
ple, and  in  the  sandy  country  of  the  Panch  Mahals  you 
see  them  going  through  the  jungle  with  their  bows  and 
arrows,  nearly  naked,  like  little  creatures  in  the  charming 
fantasies  of  Arthur  Rackham.  The  bowstring  is  a  slice 
of  cane,  but  they  are  so  practised  in  stealing  stealthily 
upon  their  prey  that  they  do  not  need  a  far-carrying  en- 
gine of  destruction.  And  the  bow  and  arrow  is  very  often 
carried  merely  as  the  London  clerk  carries  a  cane  in  the 
underground  railway  —  as  a  decoration,  or  a  companion 
for  the  hand.  The  Bhils  for  the  most  part  are  culti- 
vators. 

A  Bhil  generally  sleeps  in  the  fields  or  on  the  veranda 
of  his  house.  The  house,  built  of  teak  poles  and  bam- 
boo branches  plastered  with  mud,  is  occupied  by  the 
women,  the  children,  and  the  animals  —  buffaloes  for 
ploughing,  goats  for  milk,  and  fowls  for  eggs.  The 
centre  of  the  floor  is  usually  the  fireplace,  a  small  altar 
of  stones  on  which  dried  cow-dung  serves  as  fuel.  The 
man  rises  when  *'  the  yellow  starts  in  the  sky  " —  their 
own  phrase  for  the  dawn  —  and  smoking  his  huge  and 
unwieldy  hookah  filled  with  rude  country-grown  tobacco 
sprouts,  starts  out  for  the  fields.  Before  "  the  yellow 
starts  in  the  sky  "  the  cock  crows,  and  at  that  clarion  the 
wife  gets  up  from  the  floor  of  the  house  and  begins  to 
grind  the  Indian  corn  for  the  day's  needs.  She  then 
milks  the  cows;  and  the  children,  sometimes  only  four 
years  of  age,  go  forth  with  the  cattle  to  forest  or  to 
field.     At  eleven  o'clock  the  man  returns  from  his  weed- 


264  OTHER  SHEEP 

ing  or  ploughing,  and  he  and  the  woman  sit  down  to  eat. 
The  meal  consists  as  a  rule  of  Indian  corn  in  the  form  of 
bread  or  boiled  in  buttermilk ;  if  there  are  no  vegetables, 
salt  is  added,  but  salt  is  never  used  when  vegetables  ap- 
pear in  the  bill-of-lading  —  that  would  be  far  too  great 
a  luxury.  After  this  repast,  the  woman  goes  out  to  work 
in  the  fields  and  does  not  return  till  five  in  the  evening. 
They  are  only  busy  during  seed-time  and  harvest,  but  two 
crops  in  the  year  mean  that  their  times  of  slackness  are 
never  prolonged. 

A  farm  of  eight  acres  is  an  average  size,  and  the  rent 
is  about  twelve  annas  an  acre,  all  taxes  included.  But 
this  rent  of  a  shilling  an  acre  is  increased  by  the  unjusti- 
fiable exactions  of  Native  policemen  and  the  petty  tax-col- 
lectors called  talatis,  which  the  British  Government  la- 
bours so  courageously  to  stop.  Each  Bhil,  for  instance, 
takes  it  in  turn  to  give  a  fowl  to  the  policeman,  and 
those  who  have  no  fowls  must  needs  buy  one.  It  is 
never  well  to  fall  out  with  the  least  of  policemen  or  the 
smallest  of  petty  tax-collectors.  "  Their  right  hand  is 
full  of  bribes."  The  Bhil  is  further  harried  by  forced 
labour.  His  bullocks  and  his  carts  are  pressed  into  the 
service  of  his  Hindu  masters,  and  he  is  made  to  carry 
wood,  to  clean  up  police  stables,  or  to  do  his  share  of 
night-watch  ing  without  recompense  of  any  kind.  For 
instance,  when  all  the  people  fled  from  Dohad  in  the 
time  of  plague  the  Bhils  were  forced  to  go  into  the  town 
and  act  as  watchmen.  I  asked  an  old  Bhil  what  his  peo- 
ple thought  about  these  things.  He  smiled,  spread  his 
hands,  and  humped  his  shoulders.  "  It  is  the  Govern- 
ment, the  Government;  and  we  must  do  it."  There  was 
no  more  to  be  said.     "  If  we  do  not  do  these  things,"  he 


THE  BHILS  265 

said,  "  we  are  beaten  by  the  police ;  it  is  better  to  do 
them."  Needless,  of  course,  to  say,  that  the  British  Gov- 
ernment, far  from  countenancing  this  time-honoured  op- 
pression, does  all  in  its  power  to  end  it. 

Theoretically  the  Bhil  is  a  small  farmer,  but  in  fact  he 
is  only  the  labourer  of  the  sankar,  the  money-lender,  to 
whom  every  year  his  crops  are  mortgaged.  The  Bhil 
is  ignorant  of  accounts,  and  the  kind  sankar  does  all  this 
difficult  work  for  him  —  even  arranging  the  matter  of 
taxes.  The  Bhil  usually  agrees  to  pay  fifty  per  cent.,  but 
it  is  probable  that  he  pays  a  hundred  per  cent.  The 
sankar  allows  him  to  take  what  he  needs  from  the  crops, 
and  generally  leaves  a  little  standing  in  the  ground.  The 
sankar  is  rich;  the  Bhil  is  poor. 

I  inquired  what  the  Bhils  thought  of  this  existence 
ruled  by  a  money-lender.  "  We  are  happy,"  I  was  told, 
and  then,  after  a  pause,  "  but,  there  is  a  feeling."  Ap- 
parently, so  long  as  they  have  food,  they  are  content. 
No  people  in  the  world,  I  was  told,  think  less  of  to-mor- 
row. And  of  all  the  people  in  India  I  was  told  they  are 
the  most  moral  as  regards  sexual  matters.  If  a  girl 
goes  wrong,  according  to  them,  she  is  got  rid  of;  if  for 
some  reason  she  is  allowed  to  stay,  the  man  is  made  to 
marry  her.  This  law  is  inexorable.  They  have  a  curi- 
ous custom  that  a  girl  who  has  never  given  birth  to  chil- 
dren must  wear  white  cloth  over  her  breasts;  the  gor- 
geous colours  beloved  of  all  Indian  women  for  their 
breast-cloths  are  only  allowed  by  the  Bhils  to  those 
women  who  have  borne  children.  The  women  wear 
great  coarse  bangles  of  brass  on  their  legs,  reaching 
from  the  ankle  almost  to  the  knee;  they  are  fond  of 
jewellery,  which  they  wear  in  their  noses  and  lips,  as 


266  OTH^R  SHEEP 

well  as  in  their  ears  and  around  their  heads.  For  a 
bridegroom  to  kiss  his  bride  in  her  gala  attire  must  be 
very  like,  one  would  think,  thrusting  the  lips  through  an 
ironmonger's  shop  —  a  clattering  and  a  metallic  kiss,  not 
pretty,  but  no  doubt  exhilarating  after  the  feasting, 
dancing,  and  artificial  brawls  of  the  marriage  ceremony. 

In  the  town  of  Dohad,  at  the  house  of  a  Swedish 
Salvationist,  I  had  a  long  conversation  with  a  venerable 
Bhil  who  for  nineteen  years  has  lived  the  life  of  a  Chris- 
tian and  been  a  considerable  force  on  the  side  of  civili- 
zation and  progress  among  these  primitive  people.  This 
old  ebony-coloured  fellow,  under  his  shabby  pink-col- 
oured turban  with  its  faded  red  ribbon  bearing  the  title 
Mukti-Fauj,  which  means  Salvation  Army,  sloping 
down  towards  the  right  eye,  presented  a  curious  appear- 
ance. The  long  Semitic  nose  hung  far  over  the  upper 
lip;  the  mouth,  depressed  at  the  right  corner,  curled 
high  up  at  its  left  extremity,  leaving  two  long  horse 
teeth,  half  yellow  and  half  red  with  betel  juice,  exposed 
to  view;  these  protruding  teeth  pressed  upon  the  lower 
lip,  which  stretched  right  across  the  face  and  lost  itself 
in  iron-grey  whiskers  of  a  straggling  mutton-chop  order; 
the  face,  narrow  at  the  chin,  was  exceedingly  broad  over 
the  prominent  cheek-bones;  the  eyes  were  large  and 
handsome,  the  whites  like  porcelain,  the  brown  iris 
clouded  by  a  bluish  haze,  the  lashes  dark  and  thick ;  and 
the  entire  countenance  was  covered  with  fine  wrinkles 
and  marked  by  deep  lines,  hollow  cheeks,  and  heavy  bags 
under  the  eyes. 

While  he  squatted  on  the  ground,  watching  me  with 
an  unmistakable  scrutiny,  the  immense  mouth  performed 
amazing  evolutions  in  the  business  of  chewing  betel-nut, 


THE  BHILS  267 

while  the  withered  and  claw-Hke  hands  plucked  spas- 
modically at  the  folds  of  the  dhoti  in  his  lap.  A  little 
group  of  young  men,  one  of  them  his  son,  watched  the 
interview  on  the  veranda  from  the  dusty  yard  filled  with 
bullock-carts;  and  the  old  fellow  constantly  flashed  a 
glance  in  their  direction,  a  nonchalant  and  rather  swag- 
gering glance,  as  much  as  to  say,  ''  You  see  what  a  great 
person  I  am;  a  Sahib  from  England  has  come  to  hear 
about  our  people  and  it  is  from  me  that  he  seeks  his  in- 
formation." 

Kushal-Kangi,  to  give  him  his  honourable  name,  was 
at  one  time  a  devil-dancer,  and  was  famous  for  the  pas- 
sion of  his  frenzy  and  his  power  over  evil  spirits  through- 
out the  Panch  Mahals.  He  would  be  fetched  with  pomp 
and  circumstance  to  villages  afflicted  by  misfortune  or  to 
houses  in  which  a  person  had  suddenly  been  seized  by  a 
demon  or  stricken  down  with  illness.  He  would  dance, 
to  the  increasing  fury  of  the  local  musicians,  until  the 
sweat  poured  from  him,  his  eyes  started  from  his  head, 
and  he  was  so  elevated  that  he  could  command  the  devil 
to  go  out  or  the  fever  to  be  still. 

I  asked  him  whether  he  truly  believed  in  those  days 
that  devils  did  take  possession  of  people  and  that  he  him- 
self had  a  genuine  power  over  them  in  his  ecstasy  as  a 
devil-dancer. 

He  smiled  and  shook  his  head.  "  I  never  believed  in 
anything  of  that  kind,"  he  answered.  "  I  was  a  devil- 
dancer  for  food  and  for  respect.  It  was  an  easy  life. 
It  amused  me.  It  gave  me  the  sense  of  power  which  I 
found  agreeable.     I  did  not  believe  in  devils." 

One  day,  nineteen  years  ago  now,  the  Swedish  Sal- 
vationist in  whose  house  I  was  resting  at  Dohad,  came 


268  OTHER  SHEEP 

into  the  village  of  Ablod  and  there  met  Kushal-Kangi. 
He  was  impressed  by  the  Bhil's  intelligence,  questioned 
him,  and  found  that  he  did  not  believe  in  devils  or  credit 
himself  with  supernatural  power.  As  they  sat  at  meat 
together,  for  Kushal-Kangi  had  offered  the  invading 
stranger  the  hospitality  of  his  house,  the  Salvationist 
said  to  him  point  blank,  "  If  you  do  these  things,  in  which 
you  do  not  believe,  you  are  a  hypocrite." 

He  then  spoke  to  him  about  Christianity,  and  placing 
his  hands  on  the  Bhil's  head  prayed  that  God  would  en- 
lighten his  soul,  cleanse  his  heart,  and  make  him  a  mes- 
senger to  his  people. 

**  That  was  the  start  of  it,"  said  Kushal-Kangi,  ad- 
dressing my  host.  "  You  put  your  hands  on  my  head, 
and  you  prayed  to  God.  I  felt  that  if  it  was  true  I  must 
worship.  It  was  as  if  something  outside  of  me  was  say- 
ing to  me,  *  It  is  true:  it  is  perfectly  true;  there  is  a  God, 
and  He  is  good.'  I  felt  that  if  God  w^as  good,  I  must 
certainly  worship  Him,  and  obey  Him.  But  was  it  true  ? 
Well,  I  thought  it  was  true;  it  seemed  true;  and  there 
was  a  strong  feeling  from  outside  me  that  it  really  was 
true." 

I  asked  him  what  had  most  struck  him  in  the  message 
of  the  Salvationist.  He  answered,  "  That  God  was 
good."  It  was  no  illumination  to  him  that  there  was  a 
God,  he  really  did  not  very  much  care  whether  there  was 
a  God  or  not ;  but  that  there  was  a  good  God,  a  God  Who 
was  perfect  love  and  perfect  virtue  and  perfect  holiness, 
this  seemed  to  him  such  a  wonderful  and  beautiful  idea 
that  he  wanted  to  worship  such  a  God  immediately. 

It  is  curious  how  the  instinct  to  worship  manifested 
itself  instantly  in  this  man  who  had  never  visualized  a 


THE  BHILS  269 

Supreme  Being  and  who  had  never  prayed.  We  have 
for  so  long  a  period  come  to  regard  prayer  as  a  suppli- 
cation for  mercy  and  an  agonized  entreaty  for  help  and 
succour,  that  we  have  almost  altogether  lost  the  higher, 
calmer,  and  far  more  beautiful  form  of  communion  with 
the  Father  of  Creation  which  is  expressed  in  worship. 
The  spirit  which  overflows  in  a  glittering  minstrelsy  from 
the  skylark's  throat,  and  which  comes  to  us  in  the  splendid 
music  of  an  organ,  or  in  the  highest  poetry  of  Words- 
worth, is  the  spirit  of  outpouring  and  ecstatic  worship  — 
adoration  of  the  Ultimate,  the  Everlasting,  and  the  Beau- 
tiful. Prayer  with  the  majority  of  Christians,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  something  sad,  mournful,  and  sombre  — 
a  spirit  nowhere  to  be  found  in  Nature  and,  so  far  as  I 
am  aware,  unknown  among  primitive  peoples. 

Kushal-Kangi  was  confident  in  his  assertion  that  the 
first  conviction  which  came  to  his  soul  was  the  joyful 
and  liberating  desire  to  worship  this  good  God.  He  told 
me  that  he  went  away  to  the  forest,  escaped  from  the 
village,  freed  himself  from  contact  with  humanity,  and 
there,  on  his  knees,  offered  the  adoration  of  his  heart  to 
this  new  idea  of  a  God  Who  was  good.  It  seemed  to 
him,  instantly  and  immediately,  not  only  the  right  thing 
to  do,  but  the  happy  thing  to  do.  He  was,  as  it  were, 
transported  by  a  lovely  and  a  perfectly  beautiful  idea. 

But  he  was  conscious  of  no  effect  from  his  prayer. 
He  had  offered  worship  to  God  in  the  hope  that  such  a 
God  might  exist,  not  in  the  sure  knowledge  of  that  sub- 
lime Existence.  He  rose  from  his  knees  troubled  and 
perplexed,  but  not  discomfited.  On  his  return  he  knelt 
down  again,  and  prayed  in  the  jungle  that  if  a  good  God 
existed  the  truth  of  that  Existence  might  be  made  known 


270  OTHER  SHEEP 

to  him.  Some  of  the  villagers  saw  him  on  his  knees  and 
ran  back  to  the  village  with  the  news  that  Kushal-Kangi 
had  turned  Muhamadan.  He  rose  again  from  his  knees, 
and  still  unconscious  of  certainty,  returned  to  the  village. 
As  soon  as  he  entered  his  house,  his  children  regarding 
him  with  wonder,  he  knelt  down  for  the  third  time  and 
prayed  for  the  manifestation  of  a  good  God. 

"  At  that  moment,"  he  said,  "  I  felt  God  enter  my 
soul.  I  was  possessed  by  God.  There  was  no  doubt 
about  it.  And  so  I  believed.  I  believed  in  Him  after  I 
felt  He  had  done  me  good." 

By  the  feeling  of  "  good  "  he  means  a  feeling  of  hap- 
piness. It  was  to  him,  this  conversion,  a  liberating  and 
a  joyful  experience,  a  translation  from  darkness  to  light, 
an  uprising  from  sickness  to  health.  But  as  the  days 
passed,  he  felt  that  he  had  not  got  all  the  good  and  bless- 
ing out  of  this  new  light  in  his  soul.  He  wanted  to  be 
happier  still;  he  wanted  to  lose  himself  utterly  in  deeper 
ecstasies  of  joy. 

One  day  he  was  working  in  the  fields  when  he  felt 
himself  called  to  serve  God  just  as  if  a  voice  had  spoken 
at  his  ear.  Straightway  he  drove  his  buffaloes  back  to 
the  homestead,  and  started  off  on  the  eight-mile  walk  to 
the  house  of  the  Swedish  Salvationist.  "  I  want  to  join 
you,"  he  said;  "  I  want  to  become  a  Christian."  "  Why 
have  you  come  to  us?"  he  was  asked.  "Jesus  has  led 
me,"  he  replied ;  "  I  feel  that  He  is  leading  me  to  bring 
my  own  people  to  God."  He  was  accepted  as  a  Salva- 
tionist, and  returned  to  his  village  to  begin  his  extraor- 
dinary work  of  conversion  among  the  Bhils. 

But  at  the  beginning  he  w^as  subjected  to  persecution. 
The  headman  of  the  village  called  a  meeting  and  excom- 


THE  BHILS  271 

municated  Kushal-Kangi  for  becoming  a  Christian.  To 
be  outcasted  among  the  Bhils  meant  in  those  days  that 
the  guilty  person  could  neither  smoke  with  others  nor 
eat  with  others.  This  sentence  of  isolation  could  always 
be  turned  aside  by  the  gift  of  a  goat  to  the  headman,  but 
Kushal-Kangi  as  a  Christian  would  not  stoop  to  a  bribe, 
and  as  a  Christian  he  determined  to  make  war  upon  the 
laws  of  caste. 

Now,  among  the  Bhils,  parents  are  greatly  respected, 
it  is  almost  their  only  religion.  The  eldest  son  of  a 
family  is  called  dada  by  his  brothers  and  sisters,  which 
means  "  father,"  and  is  treated  with  considerable  rev- 
erence. When  a  man  marries,  the  eldest  brother  of  his 
bride  becomes  his  father-in-law  as  well  as  the  actual 
father  of  the  bride.  An  eldest  son,  in  fact,  is  treated 
from  the  day  of  his  birth  in  a  manner  which  educates  him 
for  the  high  office  of  parent,  so  that  the  tradition  of  rev- 
erence for  age  and  respect  for  parents  may  never  fall  into 
contempt. 

Well,  Kushal-Kangi  was  the  head  of  a  very  large  fam- 
ily, and  soon  after  he  had  been  thrown  out  of  caste  by 
the  headman,  he  sent  far  and  wide  and  summoned  all  the 
members  of  this  huge  family  to  a  conclave.  At  this  con- 
clave Kushal-Kangi  asked  his  family  to  show  their  re- 
sentment of  the  insult  put  upon  their  chief  by  the  head- 
man, and  demanded  that  they  should  outcaste  the  head- 
man, condemn  him  to  pay  the  fine,  and  refuse  to  admit 
him  into  caste  until  he  had  provided  food  for  the  whole 
village.  The  dutiful  assembly  agreed  to  these  proposals 
without  a  dissentient  voice,  and  the  judge  of  Kushal- 
Kangi  found  himself  flung  out  of  caste  by  a  handsome 
majority. 


272  OTHER  SHEEP 

It  was  this  historic  action  of  Kushal-Kangi  which  set- 
tled the  caste  question  among  the  Bhils  —  a  really  inter- 
esting and  striking  occurrence. 

By  the  manner  of  his  changed  life,  by  the  eloquence 
of  his  preaching,  and  his  untiring  kindness  to  those  in 
sorrow  and  distress,  Kushal-Kangi  has  done  an  extraor- 
dinary work  for  Christianity  among  a  people  w^hom  it 
is  really  as  difficult  to  tear  away  from  their  immemorial 
superstitions  as  to  wrench  a  screw  from  a  steel  plate. 
For  these  Bhils  are  of  so  great  an  antiquity  that  they  are 
almost  without  any  sense  of  curiosity,  without  any  desire 
for  betterment,  and  without  any  instinct  of  worship.  As 
they  bear  the  oppression  of  their  Hindu  tyrants,  patiently 
and  without  a  murmur  of  complaint,  so  they  accept  life 
as  they  find  it  and  lift  not  a  finger  to  make  it  happier  or 
better.  But  Kushal-Kangi  can  point  to  the  last  Census 
returns  and  show  that  209  people  in  his  village  registered 
themselves  as  Christians,  while  many  others  among  them 
are  Christians,  but,  fearing  the  Hindus,  have  failed  to 
confess  the  fact  to  a  Government  servant.  For  nearly 
sixteen  years  he  has  been  an  officer  in  the  Salvation  Army, 
and  his  village,  over  which  he  rules  with  the  authority  of 
a  King,  is  known  far  and  wide  as  the  most  virtuous,  law- 
abiding,  and  happy  community  throughout  the  Panch 
Mahals. 

Although  in  sexual  matters  moral  enough,  and  as  a 
rule  a  kind  and  easy-going  people,  the  Bhils  have  abso- 
lutely no  control  over  their  tempers  and  in  drink  or  in 
anger  are  careless  of  any  consequences.  Murder  is  often 
committed  in  the  Panch  Mahals,  murder  of  which  the 
Government  seldom  hears,  and  violent  explosions  of  rage 
lead  frequently  to  feuds  of  the  fiercest  and  most  blood- 


THE  BHILS  273 

thirsty  character.  But  even  quarrels  and  domestic 
brawls  are  unknown  in  the  village  of  Kushal-Kangi,  and 
his  influence  is  slowly  w^idening  with  that  of  the  British 
Government  throughout  the  Bhil  country,  making  for 
gradual  progress,  enlightenment,  and  virtue  throughout 
the  Panch  Mahals. 

I  went  with  Fakir  Singh  on  one  occasion  to  a  jungle 
village,  fourteen  miles  from  the  little  town  of  Dohad, 
miles  and  miles  away  from  soldiers  and  police,  and  miles 
away  from  the  presence  of  a  Government  official.  As  we 
stood  on  a  bare  hill,  looking  down  into  the  gloom  of  deso- 
late valleys,  and  far  away  to  the  violet  mists  of  the  ho- 
rizon, where  the  sun  had  gone  down  in  scarlet  suddenness, 
the  Fakir  said  to  me :  "  What  a  wonderful  thing  is  this 
Pax  Britannica !  Here  we  are  in  a  jungle  country^  among 
a  heathen  people  ignorant  of  God  and  acknowledging  no 
code  of  Christian  morals,  and  we  are  perfectly  safe  —  a 
few  Salvationist  missionaries  surrounded  on  all  sides  by 
thousands  of  savages !  There  has  been  nothing  quite  like 
it  in  the  world  before." 


THE  DOMS 

It  is  a  unanimous  opinion  in  India  that  Sir  John  Hewett, 
the  Lieutenant-Governor  of  the  United  Provinces,  stands 
first  among  the  little  group  of  able  men  directing  the  gov- 
ernment of  India. 

In  a  vast  province  so  perfectly  governed  that  treason  is 
almost  unknown  and  even  famine  is  handled  with  so 
sure  a  hand  that  the  mortality  is  negligible,  the  presence 
of  savage  and  lawless  people  roving  about  the  country  to 
the  terror  of  the  peaceful  and  the  ceaseless  anxiety  of  the 
police,  was  felt  by  Sir  John  Hewett  to  be  an  anachronism 
too  ridiculous  for  the  twentieth  century  and  a  slur  on  the 
British  raj  too  serious  for  him  to  suffer. 

Apparently  everything  had  been  tried  by  Government 
to  bring  these  Criminal  Tribes  abreast  of  modern  times. 
They  had  been  provided  with  land  and  cattle,  they  had 
been  so  harried  by  the  police  that  they  should  have  been 
as  w^eary  of  a  w^andering  existence  as  Poor  Jo,  and  their 
crimes  had  been  punished  with  an  unmistakable  severity. 
In  spite  of  all  this,  as  their  ancestors  had  defied  the  influ- 
ence of  Hindu  and  Muhamadan,  so  these,  their  degen- 
erate and  scarcely  human  descendants,  defied  the  British 
influence.  They  would  not  work,  they  would  not  keep 
the  peace,  and  they  would  not  refrain  from  picking  and 
stealing.  Over  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  United 
Provinces  they  roved  in  beggarly  hordes,  and  wherever 
they  went  an  army  of  police  had  to  follow  them.     Not 

274 


THE  DOMS 


275 


only  was  it  unthinkable  that  these  savages  should  be  al- 
lowed to  flout  the  raj,  but  it  was  a  very  serious  matter  of 
expense  for  the  Government  to  keep  an  eye  upon  them. 

It  chanced  on  one  occasion,  when  Sir  John  Hewett 
was  in  England  on  furlough,  that  he  heard  of  the  Salva- 
tion Army's  work  of  reclamation  and  regeneration  among 
the  broken  earthenware  of  Europe.  It  struck  him  at  once 
that  similar  methods  might  possibly  be  successful  with 
the  Criminal  Tribes  of  India.  Straightway,  then,  he 
paid  a  visit  to  General  Booth,  and  these  two  men,  so  dis- 
similar in  a  hundred  ways,  met  on  the  common  ground 
of  redemption  and  discussed  the  soul  of  man.  General 
Booth,  as  most  men  know,  is  an  old  patriarch,  thin  and 
bowed,  with  a  face  of  ivory,  dim  eyes,  hair  and  beard  the 
colour  of  snow  —  a  face  that  age,  goodness,  and  un- 
selfish labour  have  combined  to  soften  and  make  beauti- 
ful. Sir  John  Hewett,  a  very  tall  and  burly  figure,  is  in 
the  full  strength  and  power  of  middle-age,  a  man  who 
carries  himself  like  a  soldier,  has  in  his  eyes  the  soldier's 
hard  and  penetrating  scrutiny,  and  in  his  mouth  the  sol- 
dier's set  and  resolute  determination;  neither  his  life  nor 
his  temperament  have  softened  the  hard  and  vigorous 
lines  of  his  countenance ;  he  is  a  man,  one  would  say,  com- 
mitted to  business,  conscious  of  power,  used  to  obedience, 
and  the  sworn  foe  of  sentimentalism. 

But  the  old  patriarch,  with  his  dim  eyes  and  rasping 
voice,  brought  home  to  the  mind  of  the  statesman  one  of 
the  great  fundamental  truths  of  human  experience,  which 
too  often  legislators  neglect,  and  the  enemies  of  religion 
conveniently  ignore.  That  truth  may  be  expressed  in  a 
favourite  epigram  with  Mr.  Bramwell  Booth,  "  You  can- 
not make  a  man  clean  by  washing  his  shirt."     If  you  have 


2y6  OTHER  SHEEP 

a  bad  man  to  deal  with,  you  must  seek  to  alter  the  set 
and  current  of  his  soul;  if  you  have  tribes  and  nations 
of  evil-doers  to  govern,  you  must  give  them  religion.  To 
alter  the  circumstances  of  a  man's  life,  to  set  him  in  con- 
ditions where  his  liability  to  vice  is  small  and  where  the 
commission  of  sin  will  be  most  surely  punished;  to  deal, 
in  short,  only  with  the  body  of  a  man  when  it  is  his  soul 
that  is  the  cause  of  trouble  —  this  is  to  fall  upon  most 
certain  failure.  Only  one  power  is  known  in  all  the  long 
experience  of  human  history  by  which  a  bad  man  may 
become  a  good  man  —  really  and  truly  a  good  man ;  and 
this  power  is  religion. 

Sir  John  Hewett  came  to  terms  with  General  Booth. 
The  Government  agreed  to  provide  territory,  and  the  Sal- 
vation Army  undertook  to  provide  men;  the  Criminal 
Tribes  were  to  be  brought  into  this  territory,  and  the  Sal- 
vationists were  to  be  responsible  for  their  regeneration. 

Now,  in  former  times  the  Government  had  provided 
land  for  some  of  these  Criminal  Tribes,  and  the  experi- 
ment had  proved  a  dismal  failure.  What  was  the  new 
factor  in  the  present  arrangement?  A  simple  and  most 
human  thing,  and  yet  the  most  miracle-working  power  on 
earth  —  Christian  Kindness.  The  great  statesman,  the 
resolute  man  of  affairs,  yielded  to  the  argument  of  Gen- 
eral Booth  —  love  and  kindness  can  do  more  for  wicked 
men  than  an  army  of  policemen. 

Before  I  tell  the  reader  what  I  saw  of  this  quite  amaz- 
ing work  among  the  Criminal  Tribes  of  the  United  Prov- 
inces, I  should  like  him  to  realize  the  courageousness  as 
well  as  the  statesmanship  of  Sir  John  Hewett' s  action. 
No  sooner  was  it  known  what  he  was  about,  than  a  per- 


THE  DOMS 


277 


feet  outcry  was  raised  among  the  Brahmans  against  Gov- 
ernmental proselytizing  of  the  Natives.  They  had  never 
lifted  a  finger  to  help  one  of  these  unfortunate  wretches; 
on  the  contrary,  they  had  held  them  off  at  arm's  length  as 
Untouchables  and  had  themselves  by  an  unparalleled 
ostracism  and  a  most  deliberate  cruelty  been  responsible 
for  nine-tenths  of  their  crimes  and  miseries;  but  now, 
directly  that  it  seemed  Christianity  was  to  save  these 
people,  the  Hindus  became  their  loving  and  devoted  cham- 
pions, and  would  save  them  from  the  wicked  mission- 
aries of  the  British  Government.  In  all  history  can  you 
think  of  a  more  unspeakable  hypocrisy?  These  precious 
Brahmans,  whom  we  are  sometimes  asked  to  regard  as  the 
keepers  of  a  pure  religion  or  as  noble  patriots  brutally 
trodden  into  the  dust  of  their  own  native  land  by  the 
alien  heel  of  British  tyranny,  were  not  ashamed,  are  not 
at  the  present  day  ashamed,  to  raise  their  voices  and  to 
excite  public  indignation,  on  the  score  of  religion,  against 
this  little  loving  act  of  kindness  towards  the  men  and 
women  whom  they  themselves  had  made  pariahs  and  out- 
casts. 

But  their  clamour  could  not  shake  the  resolution  of 
Sir  John  Hewett.  He  stood  firm  against  all  the  fury 
that  professional  agitators  sought  to  flog  out  of  the  in- 
difference of  Hindu  Democracy.  He  had  made  it  no 
stipulation  with  General  Booth  that  the  Salvationists 
should  not  proselytize;  it  was  enough  for  him  that  Gen- 
eral Booth  had  accepted  the  task  of  reclaiming  and  regen- 
erating the  Criminal  Tribes,  and  he  was  well  aware  that 
this  act  of  Christian  Charity  was  not  undertaken  for  the 
purpose  of  inflating  the  figures  of  Salvationist  conver- 


278  OTHER  SHEEP 

sions.  His  arrangement  had  been  made,  and  by  that  ar- 
rangement Sir  John  Hewett  announced  his  unalterable 
determination  to  abide. 

Quite  recently  the  political  societies  in  India  have  taken 
an  interest  in  the  Depressed  Classes,  one  of  the  great 
fruits  of  Christianity  in  India ;  and  as  I  showed  in  a  for- 
mer chapter,  they  are  seeking  to  save  these  Depressed 
Classes  from  the  Christian  missionaries  in  order  to  estab- 
lish Brahmanism  on  a  surer  and  a  broader  foundation. 
Therefore  the  Government  of  the  United  Provinces  has 
been  severely  criticized  for  its  grants  of  land  and  money 
to  the  Salvation  Army,  and  only  the  other  day  a  debate 
took  place  in  the  Lieutenant-Governor's  council  in  which 
a  grant  of  2,400  rupees  for  the  Sansia  Colony  was  op- 
posed by  the  Hindus.  On  this  occasion  the  answer  of 
Mr.  Burn,  the  very  able  Minister  of  Finance,  w^as  not 
only  a  perfect  justification  of  Sir  John  Hewett's  policy, 
but  was  so  admirable  a  statement  of  the  whole  question 
of  these  Criminal  Tribes  that  I  shall  take  leave  to  quote 
it  in  full.     He  said :  — 

"  The  history  of  the  attempts  made  by  Government  to 
reform  and  reclaim  criminal  tribes  in  these  provinces  is 
not  an  encouraging  one.  They  began  many  years  ago 
and  many  different  methods  have  been  tried.  The  tribes 
have  been  subjected  to  every  variety  of  discipline  from  the 
slightest  to  the  most  severe.  Attempts  have  been  made 
to  settle  them  on  the  land.  When  fields  w^ere  allotted  to 
them,  they  complained  that  they  had  no  cattle.  When 
cattle  were  given  to  them,  they  sold  them.  They  asked 
for  seed,  and  when  seed  was  given  to  them,  they  ate  it 
instead  of  sowing  it.  Some  years  ago  when  a  settlement 
of  Doms  was  in  my  charge  the  only  method  which  could 


THE  DOMS  279 

be  evolved  of  seeing  that  the  land  was  sown  was  to  pay 
outsiders  to  sow  the  land  for  them  and  have  the  opera- 
tion performed  under  the  direct  supervision  of  an  offi- 
cial. There  is  one  difficulty  in  connection  with  any  offi- 
cial attempt  to  deal  with  these  people  on  which  special 
stress  must  be  laid.  Recently  there  has  been  much  dis- 
cussion in  the  public  press  as  to  what  are  called  the  de- 
pressed classes.  The  criminal  tribes  which  we  are  dis- 
cussing belong  to  these  classes.  Personally,  I  am  strongly 
of  opinion  that  all  of  them  would  describe  themselves  as 
Hindus  and  that  all  Hindus  would  so  regard  them,  but  I 
would  ask  members  to  pursue  this  a  little  farther  and 
realize  what  their  holding  to  the  Hindu  religion  means. 
Socially  they  are  beyond  the  pale.  They  may  not  enter  a 
Hindu  temple.  No  member  of  a  respectable  caste  will 
go  near  them  if  he  can  help  it.  If  one  of  them  touches 
a  member  of  a  high  caste  the  latter  is  defiled.  I  make 
these  remarks  in  no  carping  spirit,  but  simply  with  a  de- 
sire to  put  the  plain  facts  before  the  Council.  Some  of 
these  people  practise  habits  which  are  repellant  to  every- 
body. If  their  demands  are  rejected,  or  if  they  are 
crossed  in  any  way,  they  have  recourse  to  actions  of  un- 
speakable filthiness.  It  is  obvious,  having  regard  to  the 
strict  ideas  of  the  orthodox  and  high-class  Indian  com- 
munity, that  any  dealings  with  such  people  are  attended 
with  difficulty,  and  when  the  relation  between  the  criminal 
tribes  and  Indian  officials  is  one  of  subordination  on  the 
one  side  and  strict  discipline  on  the  other,  the  difficulties 
are  immensely  enhanced.  I  can  say  without  hesitation 
that  Government  is  not  satisfied  with  the  success  of  the 
work  of  reclamation  through  official  means  in  the  past. 
This  being  so,  the  Council  is  invited  to  consider  what  bet- 


28o  OTHER  SHEEP 

ter  promise  is  held  out  by  taking  advantage  of  the  offer 
of  the  Salvation  Army  to  assist.  It  is  obviously  de- 
sirable, and  indeed  necessary,  not  only  that  every  one  en- 
gaged in  the  reform  of  such  persons  should  be  competent 
and  honest,  but  also  that  they  should  put  their  hearts 
into  their  work  and  should  possess  an  unlimited  fund  of 
enthusiasm.  I  have  given  reasons  why  such  enthusiasm 
is  not  to  be  expected  from  Indian  officials,  and  I  repeat 
that  in  doing  so  I  have  no  desire  to  criticize  the  tenets  of 
Hinduism  which  make  it  impossible  that  this  should  be 
the  case.  The  Salvation  Army,  on  the  other  hand,  works 
through  officers  who  are  not  only  capable  of  enforcing 
such  discipline  as  is  required,  but  are  fully  equipped  with 
the  necessary  enthusiasm.  They  live  among  the  people 
and  enter  into  their  lives  in  a  manner  in  which  no  official 
can  be  expected  to  do.  Their  influence  is  personal  and 
humanizing.  They  study  and  learn  to  know  every  in- 
mate of  the  settlement  and  enter  into  the  lives  of  their 
charges  with  a  tact  and  zeal  that  are  already  producing 
admirable  results.  Their  officers  are  usually  married  and 
both  husband  and  wife  work  together.  These  are  briefly 
the  a  priori  reasons  why  the  help  of  the  Salvation  Army 
has  been  gladly  enlisted  by  Government.  Three  settle- 
ments have  been  placed  in  charge  of  the  Army,  (ct)  A 
Dom  settlement  at  Gorakhpur,  (&)  an  Habura  settlement 
at  Moradabad,  and  (c)  a  Bhatu  settlement  at  the  same 
place.  Most  of  the  inmates  of  these  settlements  are  em- 
ployed in  non-agricultural  industries  in  the  hope  that  they 
may  be  brought  to  practise  a  suitable  livelihood  and  may 
give  up  their  hereditary  calling  as  thieves.  These  indus- 
tries include  weaving,  carpentry,  bag-making,  rug-mak- 


THE  DOMS  281 

ing,  rope-making,  the  keeping  of  poultry  and  goats,  and 
the  rearing  of  silkworms.  Women  are  taught  sewing, 
thread-work  and  lace-work.  For  children  an  industrial 
school  has  been  opened  to  which  parents  or  guardians 
voluntarily  send  their  children  from  all  districts.  Night 
schools  for  adults  have  also  been  established  with  fair 
success.  Melas,  meetings,  feasts  and  magic  lantern  serv- 
ices are  held  at  the  settlement.  The  inmates  are  thus 
made  to  feel  that  the  settlement  is  not  a  penal  institu- 
tion or  a  system  of  compulsory  detention,  though  dis- 
cipline is  by  no  means  overlooked,  and,  when  necessary, 
is  enforced.  In  the  last  resort  a  man  who  proves  in- 
tractable in  spite  of  all  efforts  is  sent  away.  From  an 
economical  point  of  view  the  experiment  is  likely  to  cost 
much  less  than  any  of  its  predecessors.  A  married  Eu- 
ropean officer  receives  with  his  wife  fifty  rupees  a  month. 
No  Indian  of  anything  like  the  same  capability  would  be 
content  with  such  a  stipend.  The  explanation  why  per- 
sons of  some  ability  are  ready  to  work  as  they  do  for  so 
little  is  found  in  the  fact  that  their  wants  are  few  and 
their  zeal  is  great.  The  system  of  central  management 
is  thorough.  Government  is  not  asked  to  contribute  even 
the  full  expense  of  the  upkeep  of  the  settlements.  After 
a  term  of  years  the  Salvation  Army  hopes  that  many  of 
them  will  be  self-supporting.  Some  time  must  elapse  be- 
fore the  success  of  this  institution  can  be  really  judged, 
but  prospects  are  excellent. 

"  I  have  attempted  to  show  that  the  experiment  is  hope- 
ful in  every  way.  The  Honourable  Member  who  pro- 
posed this  resolution  has  asked,  that  in  making  grants  to 
the  Salvation  Army,  Government  will  insist  that  no  at- 


282  OTHER  SHEEP 

tempts  are  made  to  convert  these  people.  H  such  a  con- 
dition were  imposed  the  Salvation  Army  would  almost 
certainly  withdraw  from  the  work.  Up  to  the  present 
there  have  been  few  conversions.  It  is  possible  that  in 
future  more  of  the  inmates  will  be  drawn  to  join  the  re- 
ligion of  those  who  have  shown  themselves  to  be  their 
benefactors.  This  result  can  hardly  be  regarded  as  af- 
fording any  genuine  cause  for  complaint  on  the  part  of 
the  Hindu  community.  I  have  twice  stated  that  the  en- 
lightened classes  of  Hindus  appear  unable  owing  to  their 
religion  to  come  into  close  personal  contact  with  these 
people.  But  if  other  religious  organizations,  whether 
Hindu,  Muhamadan,  or  Christian,  choose  to  come  for- 
ward to  make  similar  efforts,  if  they  can  show  as  good 
credentials  as  the  Salvation  Army  has  shown,  and  that 
they  are  ready  to  co-operate  as  the  Salvation  Army  has 
co-operated,  I  do  not  think  there  would  be  any  reluctance 
on  the  part  of  the  Government  to  afford  them  such  as- 
sistance as  has  been  given  to  the  Salvation  Army.  Last 
of  all,  the  members  of  the  tribes  themselves  are  entitled 
to  some  voice  in  the  matter.  I  have  recently  seen  a  let- 
ter describing  the  latest  development  and  will  conclude 
my  remarks  by  reading  an  extract  from  it.  The  letter 
says:  *A  party  of  Bhatus  are  marching  towards  Mo- 
radabad  from  Farrukhabad  to  apply  for  admission  into 
our  settlement.  There  are  a  lot  of  men  in  the  party  who 
are  hiding  in  the  jungles  to  keep  away  from  the  police.' 
The  simple  brevity  of  this  account  is  sufficient.  I  ask  the 
Council  to  oppose  the  resolution  on  the  ground  that  it 
would  destroy  at  its  inception  the  most  promising  experi- 
ment which  has  yet  been  tried,  an  experiment  which  has 
as  its  aim  the  elevation  of  an  unfortunate  class  which  will 


THE  DOMS  283 

otherwise  remain  sunk  in  degradation  and  a  nuisance  to 
its  neighbours." 

From  this  official  utterance  the  reader  will  perceive  that 
the  Government's  difficulty  in  dealing  with  the  Criminal 
Tribes  is  a  great  one,  that  it  is  complicated  in  recent  times 
by  the  jealousy  of  Hindu  politicians  working  for  the  re- 
form of  Brahmanism,  and  that  religion  is  recognized  by 
the  greatest  statesmen  in  India  as  a  supreme  force  in  the 
regeneration  of  humanity.  The  reference  of  Mr.  Burn 
to  the  ''  necessary  enthusiasm  "  of  Salvationists  seems  to 
me  an  utterance  significant  enough  to  attract  the  attention 
of  politicians  in  Europe  and  to  arouse  the  zeal  of  Chris- 
tendom. 

Certainly  what  I  saw  of  Salvation  Army  work  among 
the  primitive  peoples  of  India  vastly  increased  my  respect 
for  that  extraordinary  organization,  which,  all  over  the 
world,  is  doing  spade  work  for  civilization  with  results 
that  are  among  the  first  evidences  of  Christian  truth.  I 
shall  now  give  the  reader  some  idea  of  this  work  in  the 
United  Provinces,  beginning  with  a  numerous  and  inter- 
esting tribe  known  as  the  Doms  —  a  name  w^hich  is  pro- 
nounced like  our  w^ord  domes. 

I  made  acquaintance  with  these  people  at  Gorakhpur, 
one  of  the  cleanest  and  pleasantest  towns  in  all  India. 
The  settlement  is  just  beyond  the  native  quarter,  and  in 
charge  of  it,  alone  w4th  all  these  dangerous  criminals,  is 
a  Scotsman  and  his  wife.  The  first  sight  that  struck  me 
on  passing  through  the  gateway  and  entering  the  dusty 
square  surrounded  by  mud  houses,  w^as  a  pretty  and  fair- 
haired  British  child  standing  in  the  midst  of  half-naked 
and  wild-looking  natives  —  the  child  of  the  Salvationists. 
The  full  romance  of  this  spectacle  did  not  come  home  to 


284  OTHER  SHEEP 

my  mind  until  I  had  studied  the  Doms  and  penetrated 
into  the  savage  darkness  of  their  minds. 

The  men  are  a  tall  and  muscular  race  but  without  the 
smallest  suggestion  of  enthusiasm,  virility,  or  intelligent 
consciousness  in  their  heavy  and  animal  faces.  The 
women,  on  the  other  hand,  struck  me  as  handsome  if 
fierce  and  tigerish  creatures  —  tall  and  vigorous  women 
who  held  their  heads  splendidly,  walked  like  goddesses, 
and  flashed  great  eyes  of  confident  self-approval  at  any 
stranger  who  presumed  to  gaze  at  them.  To  look  from 
the  men  to  the  women  was  like  looking  from  one  race 
to  another,  from  one  epoch  to  another  epoch,  almost  from 
barbarism  to  civilization.  In  no  race  of  men  I  have  ever 
encountered  was  the  feeling  stronger  with  me  of  a  soul- 
lessness  and  absence  of  mentality  which  seem  sometimes 
to  separate  uncivilized  people  from  the  human  species. 
One  felt  that  these  people  were  mankind  in  the  making, 
the  dough  of  humanity,  not  the  bread,  something  out  of 
which  the  race  of  man  might  ultimately  be  produced; 
one  did  not  feel  that  they  were  ignorant,  weak,  fallen,  or 
degenerate;  the  central  conviction  was  that  they  repre- 
sented some  transitional  species  between  the  absolute  ani- 
mal and  the  incipient  man. 

There  are  many  hordes  of  this  gypsy-like  tribe  in  the 
United  Provinces.  They  are  thieves  by  tradition  and  by 
nature,  and  the  vigilance  of  police  and  the  rigour  of  prison 
have  combined  to  make  them  feel  that  life  is  a  misery. 
Until  Government  entrusted  them  to  the  Salvation  Army, 
I  do  not  suppose  a  more  wretched  and  unhappy  people 
were  to  be  found  on  the  earth's  surface.  For  while  steal- 
ing seemed  to  them  the  only  occupation  of  life  and  the 
only  means  of  living,  law  and  order  stood  in  their  path. 


THE  DOMS  285 

dogged  their  footsteps,  and  laid  them  by  the  heels  on 
every  occasion  that  they  followed  their  natural  instincts. 
They  tell  stories  to  each  other  of  their  ancestors.  Ac- 
cording to  their  tradition  there  was  at  one  time  a  Dom 
rajah.  In  those  days  they  were  rich.  They  built  fine 
houses  and  laid  out  magnificent  gardens.  They  fought 
for  their  wives  —  Homeric  wars.  When  a  man  stole 
another  man's  wife,  the  relations  of  the  defrauded  man 
would  rise  up  and  go  in  pursuit  of  that  wicked  man. 
Life  was  good  then  —  a  ceaseless  battle. 

But  these  stories  only  come  on  the  rarest  occasions. 
The  general  talk  is  of  thieving  and  crime.  The  Doms 
have  become  a  tribe  of  petty  thieves,  stealers  of  dirty 
towels  and  goats  and  fowls,  and  their  conversation  has 
descended  to  the  pettiness  of  their  thefts.  Talk  of  this 
nature  is  occasionally  diverted  by  ghost  stories. 

They  have  a  conception  of  some  life  after  death,  but 
cannot  say  what  that  life  is  like  and  show  very  little  curi- 
osity concerning  it.  They  believe  that  there  will  be  a 
place  for  the  Doms  in  the  next  world.  When  a  man  dies 
they  place  drink  and  curry  in  the  mouth,  lay  a  pipe  in  the 
grave,  and  say  to  the  corpse,  "  When  you  wake  up  in  the 
next  world  be  sure  and  go  to  the  Dom  Khana,  where  you 
will  get  plenty  of  gambling.''  They  do  not  trouble  about 
this  next  world;  they  do  not  care  what  becomes  of  them 
or  where  they  go;  and  they  think  that  exactly  the  same 
fate  —  whatever  it  may  be  —  awaits  both  good  and  bad. 

They  have  an  absolute  faith  in  the  devil,  but  do  not 
place  him  outside  of  the  world.  They  believe  that  the 
earth  belongs  to  him,  or  at  any  rate  that  he  is  the  chief 
power  on  the  earth,  and  to  him  they  attribute  every  ill 
and  every  misfortune,  and  even  death  itself.     They  are 


286  OTHER  SHEEP 

afraid  of  the  devil  in  this  hfe,  terribly  afraid,  but  they 
laugh  at  the  idea  that  there  is  any  devil  in  the  next  v^orld. 
They  tell  one  with  emphasis,  "  The  devil  lives  in  this 
world."  Like  the  Hindus  they  number  amongst  them 
men  who  profess  to  cast  out  devils. 

Once  upon  a  time  the  Government  gave  these  people 
land,  ploughs,  and  cattle.  The  Doms  killed  the  cows,  ate 
them,  and  sold  the  hides.  The  land  w^as  taken  away  from 
them  for  this  dishonourable  conduct.  And  now  they 
feel  that  a  great  act  of  injustice  has  been  perpetrated 
against  them.  They  claim  that  the  land  is  still  theirs. 
Certain  Doms,  in  fact,  live  on  this  land.  Of  all  the  sub- 
jects in  the  world  the  one  they  are  most  eloquent  about 
is  this  "robbery"  of  their  land  —  they  will  talk  to  you 
about  it  with  flowing  words,  faces  of  indignation,  and 
gestures  of  a  most  righteous  anger.  "  The  land  was 
given  to  us,"  they  say;  "how  can  it  belong  to  other 
people  ?  " 

I  noticed  that  while  the  young  men  and  lads  were  as 
dough-like  and  loutish  as  the  grown  men,  the  younger 
children  showed  evidences  of  brightness  and  intelligence. 
The  handsome  and  tigerish  women  get  their  fine  looks 
from  the  sway  they  exercise  over  the  men;  women  do 
not  steal,  but  they  tell  men  to  steal ;  no  man,  they  say,  is 
worth  marrying  who  has  not  stolen  so  much  jewellei*y; 
they  are  the  spokesmen  for  the  men  and  can  face  a  Gov- 
ernment inspector  or  an  official  of  the  police  with  an  al- 
most insolent  self-assurance.  But  the  brightness  and 
intelligence  of  the  children  come  from  another  source. 
They  are  the  first-fruits  of  education,  kindness,  and  the 
influence  of  Christianity.  The  response  they  make  to  the 
treatment  of  the  lonely  Scotsman  and  his  wife  is  remark- 


THE  DOMS  287 

able.  They  seize  at  once  the  notion  of  morality,  the  dif- 
ference between  right  and  wrong,  the  idea  that  goodness 
is  something  better  and  wiser  and  fitter  than  sin  and 
crime.  Not  only  this,  they  exhibit  undoubted  intelli- 
gence, and  become  skilled  weavers  and  makers  of  carpets. 
One  touch  of  kindness  —  how  romantic  to  think  it  came 
from  Scotland !  —  has  transformed  these  young  barbari- 
ans, marked  for  misery  and  evil,  into  quick-witted,  moral 
and  happy  human  beings. 

But  it  is  heartbreaking  work  for  the  lonely  Scotsman 
and  his  wife  to  make  the  adult  Dom  conscious  of  a  good 
God  and  a  revealing  Christ.  Here  and  there  they  see 
the  light  break  into  the  darkness  of  a  soul,  but  for  the 
most  part  to  attempt  to  teach  religion  to  these  people  is 
like  trying  to  teach  a  dog  to  sing  or  a  parrot  to  paint. 

Among  their  converts  is  a  very  interesting  man,  so  su- 
perior in  appearance  to  the  other  Doms  that  I  could  not 
at  first  think  he  belonged  to  them;  a  man  between  thirty 
and  forty,  with  regular  and  handsome  features,  intelli- 
gent eyes,  a  firm  mouth,  and  hair  so  carefully  parted  and 
brushed  and  moustache  so  dandified  that  but  for  his  black 
skin  he  might  have  passed  for  a  European  man  of  fashion. 

His  name  is  Chitra,  and  he  was  born  in  a  Dom  village. 
He  roamed  with  his  parents  in  the  jungle  till  the  Govern- 
ment drove  them  into  a  Khana.  He  remembers  little  of 
the  jungle  life,  but  his  parents  told  him  about  it,  and  talk 
in  the  Khana  was  chiefly  about  the  crimes  committed 
during  that  wandering  life.  Religion  of  any  kind  was 
never  mentioned.  He  had  absolutely  no  idea  of  a  God. 
His  ideas  of  right  and  wrong  were  made  for  him  by 
Government.  To  steal  was  wrong  because  it  meant  the 
jail.     Apparently  there  is  no  code  of  morality  among  the 


288  OTHER  SHEEP 

Doms.  A  husband  may  share  his  wife,  if  the  wife  agree ; 
trouble  never  arises  unless  the  husband  objects,  and  then 
there  is  always  a  fight.  One  thing  alone  among  them  is 
counted  indubitably  wrong,  and  that  is  the  violation  of 
a  child.  After  thirteen  or  fourteen  a  girl  is  free  to  the 
world,  but  before  that  age  she  is  sacrosanct.  To  lie,  far 
from  being  wrong,  is  a  high  attainment.  Nothing  is 
counted  greater  among  them  than  the  ability  to  deceive. 
Drunkenness  is  highly  enjoyed,  and  is  not  considered 
wrong;  they  rejoice  that  for  a  couple  of  pice  a  man  can 
buy  enough  arrack  to  make  him  supremely  and  deliciously 
drunk.  It  is  the  finest  thing  in  the  world  to  them,  this 
escape  from  the  burden  of  consciousness  and  the  ennui 
of  their  wretched  existence.  They  are  extremely  taciturn 
among  themselves,  and  will  seldom  declare  how  they 
came  by  money,  jewellery,  or  any  other  property  cun- 
ningly acquired  from  the  common  enemy.  A  man  will 
suddenly  give  evidences  of  prosperity.  His  greatest 
friend  will  say  admiringly,  "  You  are  very  rich."  The 
other  will  bow  his  acknowledgments.  After  a  pause  the 
friend  will  ask,  "How  did  it  come?" — and  the  answer 
will  be,  "  Who  knows  ?  "  Again  a  pause,  and  then  the 
questioner  will  inquire  confidentially,  "  Was  it  stolen  ?  " 
And  with  a  blank  countenance  the  lucky  man  will  reply, 
"Who  knows?" 

Chitra  told  me  the  story  of  his  conversion.  "  When  I 
came  into  the  Salvation  Army  Settlement  I  learned  to 
work  and  I  listened  to  what  was  said  to  me.  I  got  to 
know  that  God  had  made  me.  It  must  have  been  the 
Spirit  of  God  that  revealed  this  knowledge  to  me.  It 
came  suddenly.  It  did  not  seem  strange.  At  once  it 
seemed  true.     My  spirit  answered  as  if  it  knew.     I  re- 


THE  DOMS  289 

member  that  when  I  was  asked,  *  Where  is  God  ?  ' —  I 
replied,  '  In  every  place.*  And  when  I  was  asked, 
*  Where  is  God  as  far  as  you  are  concerned  ?  ' —  that  I 
answered,  '  In  my  heart.'  And  I  used  to  pray,  *  Open 
my  heart's  door.'  I  became  conscious  in  my  heart  of 
God  telling  me  what  was  right  and  what  was  wrong;  I 
am  still  conscious  of  God  in  my  heart;  He  is  always  tell- 
ing me  what  is  right  and  what  is  wrong." 

I  asked  him,  "  Can  you  remember  what  were  your  first 
feelings  when  you  heard  that  there  was  a  good  God  ?  " 
"  My  first  feeling,"  he  replied,  "  was  fear.  I  was  afraid 
because  of  the  wrong  in  me."  "  Had  you  been  afraid 
because  of  the  wrong  in  you,  before  you  heard  of  a 
God?  "  "  No,  it  did  not  trouble  me.  When  I  felt  that 
there  truly  was  a  God,  then  I  was  afraid.  But  I  was  not 
afraid  for  long.  After  my  fear,  then  came  gladness.  I 
began  to  feel  happy.  Little  by  little,  for  a  year  and  a 
half,  I  was  learning  about  God.  Then  the  truth  came  to 
me,  and  I  was  no  longer  afraid  at  all." 

Soon  after  he  had  settled  down  to  a  useful  life,  the 
desire  to  have  a  child  became  very  great  with  him.  He 
had  been  married  for  some  time,  but  no  children  had  come 
to  cheer  his  home.  With  a  Dom,  as  with  every  Hindu, 
the  desire  for  a  child  is  so  great  as  to  be  a  passion. 
Chitra,  fresh  from  savagery,  could  not  control  this  in- 
stinct. He  looked  about  in  the  Settlement,  saw^  a  woman 
whose  husband  was  in  jail,  and  took  her  into  his  home. 
The  Salvationist,  discovering  this  state  of  things,  turned 
Chitra  and  the  second  wife  out  of  the  Settlement.  In 
two  months  he  returned  and  begged  to  be  taken  back. 
His  repentance  was  sincere.  The  husband  of  the  second 
■wife  was  out  of  jail  and  ready  to  take  his  wife  and  to 


290  OTHER  SHEEP 

forgive  her  for  this  union  with  Chitra.  As  for  Chitra's 
wife,  she  wanted  nothing  better  in  the  world  than  to 
have  her  husband  restored  to  her.  So  the  matter  ended, 
and  both  couples  are  now  thoroughly  happy  and  the  best 
of  friends.  But  Chitra's  wife  came  at  Christmas-time 
to  the  wife  of  the  Salvationist,  and  asked  if  she  might 
have  a  doll  for  her  present.  Whether  this  request  was 
made  out  of  the  hunger  and  pathos  of  her  motherless 
heart,  or  whether  it  is  a  relic  of  that  ancient  homceopathic 
magic  common  among  almost  every  primitive  people,  I 
do  not  know ;  but  it  was  rather  a  tragic  sight  to  see  the 
pretty  wife  of  Chitra  with  the  doll  in  her  lap,  and  Chitra 
looking  on,  and  trying  to  make  it  seem  a  matter  of  no  con- 
sequence. 

Chitra  has  been  three  times  in  prison.  His  first  sen- 
tence was  a  year  for  burglary,  and  at  the  time  the 
burglary  was  committed  he  was  asleep  in  his  own  house. 
His  second  sentence  was  a  year  for  stealing,  and  again 
he  was  innocent.  The  third  sentence  was  one  of  two 
years,  and  this  time  he  was  really  guilty  —  he  had  run 
away  from  the  village  to  escape  the  persecution  of  the 
police.  He  told  me  that  he  never  worked;  that  he  used 
to  get  his  food  by  begging.  The  Doms,  he  said,  are  very 
clever  at  whining  money  and  food  out  of  other  people; 
but  they  boldly  intimidate  and  threaten  the  farmers  who 
are  now  in  possession  of  their  land  —  the  land  once  given 
to  them  by  Government. 

I  asked  him  what  was  the  general  feeling  among  the 
Doms  concerning  themselves  and  their  position  among 
other  peoples.  "  The  Doms  are  proud  of  themselves,  be- 
cause they  know  that  other  people  fear  them.  They  like 
to  think  that  they  can  frighten  a  man  by  looking  in  at 


THE  DOMS  291 

his  door  or  following  him  into  the  fields.  But  they  are 
now  tired  of  a  life  which  is  never  safe  from  the  police, 
and  they  are  coming  to  the  Salvation  Army  in  consid- 
erable numbers,  begging  to  be  taken  into  the  Settlement 
and  taught  a  trade,  or  at  any  rate  protected  from  police 
interference." 

I  inquired  if  they  readily  understood  the  religion  of 
Christianity  as  he  explained  it  to  them.  "  It  is  most  dif- 
ficult," he  answered,  "  to  make  them  understand  anything 
about  religion.  They  understand  the  morality  of  Chris- 
tianity, but  not  the  religion.  When  you  say  to  them, 
It  is  wrong  to  do  this  or  it  is  sinful  to  do  that;  they  will 
nod  their  heads,  and  they  will  tell  you,  '  That  is  good 
teaching.'  But  when  you  speak  about  a  good  God  in 
heaven,  about  love  for  this  God,  about  longing  to  see 
Him,  and  about  the  promise  of  Jesus  —  no!  they  do  not 
understand;  it  puzzles  them;  they  shake  their  heads  and 
say,  *  We  do  not  know.'  To  show  you  how  difficult  it  is; 
they  could  not  understand  prayer  when  they  first  came 
into  the  Settlement!  New  people  who  come  in  now, 
laugh  when  they  see  us  praying.  They  do  not  know  what 
prayer  is,  and  when  we  try  to  explain,  they  laugh;  they 
think  it  foolish.  But  the  word  has  become  a  part  of  their 
new  language.  When  we  hold  a  meeting,  no  matter  what 
it  is  about,  they  say  to  each  other,  *  Come  to  Prayer.' 
Some  of  them  are  more  intelligent  than  others.  Some 
are  completely  changed  by  religion.  But  most  of  them 
are  too  ignorant,  or  too  tired,  or  too  miserable  to  care 
anything  about  it.  They  are  not  even  curious.  It  is 
very  seldom  that  they  talk  about  religion  amongst  them- 
selves. Hardly  ever  do  they  ask  me  a  question.  And 
my  difficulty  is,  that  while  I  can  explain  to  them  the  feel- 


292  OTHER  SHEEP 

ings  of  my  own  heart,  I  can  never  say  whether  they  un- 
derstand. They  never  tell  you,  *  We  do  not  understand,' 
and  they  never  ask,  *  Will  you  explain  this  or  that  ?  ' — 
they  only  say,  *  We  do  not  know.'  But  it  is  certain  that 
they  are  happy  here.  Doms  come  from  all  parts,  begging 
us  to  find  room  for  them ;  and  they  understand  the  moral- 
ity of  Christianity  directly  we  begin  to  teach  them.  The 
next  generation  will  be  civilized,  and  Christians." 

It  is  worth  noticing  that  in  the  case  of  these  Doms 
the  appeal  has  first  to  be  made  to  the  reason,  not  to  the 
heart.  Their  reason  responds  to  moral  teaching;  but 
their  hearts  remain  obstinately  closed  to  emotion  and  love. 
Among  civilized  people,  religion  appeals  first  to  the  heart, 
and,  as  Coleridge  so  well  pointed  out,  the  intelligence  is 
developed  and  enlarged  afterwards,  by  the  healthful  ac- 
tion of  this  cleansed  heart. 

Another  Dom  spoke  to  me  about  prison  life.  What 
he  narrated  is  probably  true,  but  the  Government,  of 
course,  have  no  hand  in  the  shameful  part  of  it.  It  is 
the  Indian  who  is  hard  on  the  Indian.  Let  the  English 
chief  turn  his  back,  and  Native  afflicts  Native,  and  the 
Jack-in-office  becomes  a  tyrant.  I  could  give  many  in- 
stances of  this  unfortunate  state  of  things.  "  In  jail," 
said  this  Dom,  "  they  give  us  little  food  and  much  water. 
They  do  nothing  to  teach  us  or  touch  our  hearts.  The 
warders  are  very  brutal.  They  carry  a  stick  like  a  roller, 
and  they  hit  us  with  it.  They  say  to  us,  'If  you  don't 
make  your  relations  give  us  money,  we  will  beat  you.' 
Doms  come  to  us  and  beg  for  money  to  give  to  these 
warders,  so  that  their  sons  or  their  fathers  or  their 
brothers  may  not  be  beaten.  One  warder  would  put  men 
in  water  up  to  the  neck  for  an  hour.     First  he  Vn^ouM 


THE  DOMS  293 

beat  them,  then  put  them  in  the  water;  then  take  them 
out,  beat  them,  and  put  them  back  in  the  water;  and  a 
third  time.  Beat  —  water ;  beat  —  water ;  beat  —  water ; 
three  times.  Other  warders  hit  men  with  their  fists. 
When  a  Dom  comes  out  of  prison  he  is  often  dazed  and 
numb;  many  die  soon  after.  One  warder  watches  at 
night  to  prevent  talking,  fighting,  smoking,  and  gam- 
bhng.  No  talking  is  allowed  night  or  day.  I  was  in 
prison  for  two  years,  all  except  two  months ;  it  was  terri- 
ble. I  came  to  the  services  in  the  Settlement  because  I 
wanted  to  give  up  thieving  and  lying,  to  do  work,  to  earn 
my  living,  and  to  remain  in  the  peace  and  happiness  of 
the  Settlement.  I  can  now  earn  nine  and  a  half  rupees 
a  month.  I  say  to  the  others,  '  Better  for  you  to  be  like 
me.  I  do  not  steal.  I  am  not  sent  to  jail.  I  pray  to 
God.  I  earn  money.  I  am  happy.'  They  see  that  I  am 
happy.  I  always  say  to  them,  *  See  how  happy  I  am. 
Is  it  not  a  fine  thing  to  be  happy  ?  '  And  they  say,  *  It  is 
true ;  we  want  to  be  good.'  Oh,  a  great  change  is  taking 
place  among  the  Doms.  The  old  race  will  die  out,  and  a 
new  one  will  be  born.  All  the  children  will  soon  be 
Christians.  There  will  be  no  more  crime,  and  no  more 
jail." 

The  splendid  little  Scotsman  in  charge  of  this  Settle- 
ment agrees  that  a  great  change  is  taking  place,  although 
he  makes  the  frank  acknowledgment  that  no  one  could 
say  the  Doms  are  Christians.  "  When  we  first  started," 
he  said,  ''  I  used  to  be  wakened  from  sleep  in  the  middle 
of  the  night  by  a  noise  like  pandemonium,  and  I  had  to  go 
down  and  separate  the  men,  who  were  fighting  like  wild 
beasts.  It  really  was  hardly  safe  in  those  days.  But  we 
stuck  to  it,  and  prayer  and  kindness  have  succeeded  so 


394  OTHER  SHEEP 

far  as  to  put  a  stop  to  all  fierceness  and  fighting.  They 
realize  now  that  the  Mukti-Fauj  is  here  to  help  them; 
that  we  are  not  agents  of  the  police,  but  Christians  try- 
ing to  be  kind  and  helpful.  I  do  not  think  we  should 
be  criticized  for  our  slowness  to  convert.  One  must  rec- 
ognize that  our  task  is  first  to  make  the  Doms  human, 
and  then  Christians.  They  are  demoralized  at  present 
by  their  own  habits  and  by  the  brutality  of  the  police. 
There  are  only  some  four  European  officers  to  all  the 
police  looking  after  these  three  million  Doms;  it  is  im- 
possible to  prevent  tyranny  and  injustice.  But  there  has 
been  a  vast  improvement  among  the  police  in  recent  years. 
Sir  John  Hewett  has  handled  this  matter  finely.  He  has 
not  relaxed  the  severity  which  is  really  necessary  in  deal- 
ing with  large  bodies  of  nomadic  and  marauding  tribes, 
but  he  has  taken  steps  to  prevent  that  severity  from  be- 
coming the  weapon  of  the  blackmailer.  The  Govern- 
ment, indeed,  has  been  splendid  in  this  matter.  One  of 
them  came  to  see  our  Industrial  Exhibition,  and  he  said 
publicly  that  by  going  for  the  inside  of  the  Doms  instead 
of  the  outside,  the  Salvation  Army  had  done  more  in 
two  years  than  the  Government,  with  all  the  forces  of 
law  and  order  at  its  disposal,  had  been  able  to  do  in 
twenty-five  years." 

He  told  me  that  in  the  worst  of  these  Doms  there  is 
always  something  to  which  appeal  may  be  made.  One 
of  these  police-hunted  wretches,  he  said,  went  away  to 
Jamaica  and  there  made  money,  learned  English,  secured 
a  good  position,  and  was  free  of  all  fear ;  but  he  came  back 
to  the  Dom  country  and  was  almost  immediately  seized 
by  the  police  and  thrown  into  jail.  "  Why  did  you 
come  back?  "  asked  the  Scot.     "  Dis  heart,"  he  answered, 


THE  DOMS  295 

placing  his  hand  on  his  breast  and  bursting  into  tears, 
"  long  to  see  poor  old  mother." 

I  paid  a  visit  to  the  jail  on  a  certain  Sunday  morning, 
as  I  wanted  to  see  the  religious  service  which  the  Salva- 
tion Army  is  now  permitted  to  hold  in  the  prison  for  the 
benefit  of  Dom  prisoners.  We  drove  out  from  Gorakh- 
pur  in  a  carriage,  and  passed  through  charming  country 
rendered  more  delightful  by  the  brightness  of  the  sun,  the 
freshness  of  the  air,  and  the  scents  of  Spring  which  came 
to  us  on  the  cooling  wind.  The  jail  is  approached  by  a 
long  avenue  of  alternate  tamarind  and  teak  trees,  the  pale 
red  walls,  tiled  roofs,  and  gate  of  entry  with  its  armed 
sentinel,  blocking  out  the  tender  blue  of  distance  with  a 
sinister  abruptness.  But  even  the  prison  walls,  the 
guarded  gate,  and  the  threatening  bayonet  of  the  sentry, 
could  not  rob  the  goodness  from  the  air  or  cloud  the  joy 
of  that  perfect  morning  in  Spring.  I  had  no  melan- 
choly thoughts  or  feelings  of  depression  as  the  gate 
opened  and  I  passed  into  the  shadow  of  this  human  cage. 

Through  the  heavy  gateway  one  passed  into  a  paved 
court,  from  whose  coolness  and  shadows  one  saw  that 
the  avenue  of  trees  left  outside  the  barred  door,  but  this 
time  formed  only  of  tamarinds,  was  continued  across  a 
green  and  sunny  space  to  the  inner  buildings  of  the 
prison.  Under  the  two  first  tamarind  trees  on  the  left 
hand  side  of  the  central  path  crossing  this  space,  and  oc- 
cupying in  horseshoe  formation  a  wide  circle  of  broken 
pink  brick  between  the  path  and  the  grass,  was  gathered 
the  congregation  of  Dom  prisoners.  They  were  dressed 
for  the  most  part  in  awkward  thick  hairy  coats  of  dark 
grey  edged  with  white,  and  wore  from  a  steel  ring  circling 
their  necks  a  block  of  wood  stamped  with  the  dates  of 


296  OTHER  SHEEP 

their  sentences  and  the  Act  under  which  they  had  been 
convicted.  Two  or  three  had  steel  gyves  upon  their 
ankles,  but  the  majority  wore  only  a  single  ring  on  one 
leg,  to  which  the  full  fetters  would  be  attached  when 
there  was  any  danger  of  escape.  They  were  squatting 
on  their  haunches,  the  arms  laid  across  the  knees,  the 
heads  inclining  wearily  in  every  case  towards  one  of  the 
humped  shoulders.  Upon  their  shaven  heads  was  a  small 
round  cap  —  foul,  greasy,  and  worn  at  as  many  different 
angles  as  there  were  prisoners. 

Before  this  horseshoe  of  wretched  humanity,  was  a  row 
of  chairs  in  which  we  were  invited  by  the  Salvationists, 
two  of  them  converted  Doms,  to  take  our  seats.  The 
sun  shining  through  the  soft  leaves  of  the  tamarinds 
chequered  the  pink  ground  with  light  and  shade  and 
sprinkled  a  dust  of  gold  upon  the  unhappy  captives; 
two  or  three  warders  in  khaki  and  tall  turbans  of  gloomy 
blue,  their  club-like  truncheons  under  their  arms,  stood 
looking  at  the  gathering  in  the  full  sunlight  of  the  cen- 
tral path;  gangs  of  prisoners  passed  every  now  and  then 
on  the  narrow  paths  slanting  across  the  grass  of  the  court; 
ten  or  eleven  prisoners  at  a  distance  of  some  fifty  yards 
sat  upon  their  haunches  and  listened  to  the  service;  the 
Native  doctor  was  busy  weighing  a  section  of  his  five 
hundred  captives  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  avenue;  the 
clink-clank  of  prisoners  toiling  in  the  blacksmith's  shop 
came  to  us  from  the  distance ;  in  the  trees,  on  the  roofs, 
and  in  the  dust  of  the  paths  birds  were  quarrelling  and 
chirping  with  all  the  energy  of  urgent  controversy. 

The  service  was  extremely  simple.  The  Salvationist 
of  the  Settlement,  making  his  rich  Scotch  accent  sound 
through  his  Hindustani,  repeated  sentence  by  sentence 


THE  DOMS  297 

the  words  of  a  hymn  and  then  beating  time  with  his 
right  hand  led  the  singing.  This  singing  was  the  work 
of  the  Salvationists.  The  crouching  prisoners  sang  not 
a  word  and  in  their  eyes  was  the  dull  listlessness  of  a 
dense  stupor.  A  prayer  followed,  a  prayer  that  God, 
who  is  Father  of  all  men,  would  make  Himself  mani- 
fest that  day  and  bless  with  His  presence  and  His  mercy 
the  service  held  in  the  prison.  None  of  the  prisoners 
bowed  his  head,  closed  his  eyes,  or  covered  his  face. 
Afterwards  the  same  Salvationist  spoke  of  Christ  and 
the  revelation  made  by  Him  of  God's  way  to  the  King- 
dom of  Heaven.  The  Doms  did  not  shift  their  posi- 
tions nor  manifest  the  least  interest.  There  was  more 
singing,  and  then  one  of  the  converted  Doms,  dressed  in 
the  red  jacket  of  the  Salvation  Army,  bareheaded  and 
holding  in  his  hand  a  New  Testament,  stood  before  the 
prisoners.  He  told  them  to  open  their  hearts  to  the 
Spirit  of  God.  "It  is  wrong,"  he  said,  "to  steal;  it  is 
wrong  to  get  drunk;  it  is  wrong  to  gamble  and  fight. 
When  you  do  these  things,  the  police  catch  you,  and 
you  are  locked  up  in  prison.  See  how  you  suffer!  Sin 
is  always  punished.  You  cannot  be  happy  while  you  do 
wrong.  It  is  only  by  doing  good  that  a  man  can  be 
happy.  Sin  is  punished  on  earth,  and  it  is  punished  in 
hell.  Heaven  is  only  for  those  who  are  good  and  love 
God.  If  you  want  to  go  to  heaven  you  must  be  good. 
If  you  want  to  have  a  happy  home,  with  a  wife  and  chil- 
dren, you  must  be  good.  I  was  like  you  till  I  gave  my 
heart  to  God.  I  used  to  steal  and  drink.  I  was  taken 
away  from  my  home.  I  was  locked  up  in  prison.  My 
heart  was  full  of  sin.  But  the  Spirit  of  God  taught  me 
the  way  to  happiness.     I  gave  up  sin.     I  learnt  to  work 


298  OTHER  SHEEP 

for  my  bread.  And  now  I  am  happy.  You  must  open 
your  hearts  to  God.  You  must  give  up  sin.  You  must 
come  into  the  Salvation  Army  Settlement  and  learn  to 
work  for  your  living.     Then  you  will  be  happy  like  me." 

Throughout  this  earnest  and  straightforward  address 
I  carefully  studied  the  faces  of  the  prisoners.  Not  in  one 
of  them  could  I  discover  the  smallest  beginning  of  re- 
sponse, the  least  trace  of  understanding.  Like  men  half- 
stupefied  by  a  drug,  or  worn  to  the  point  of  sleep  by 
some  laborious  exercise,  they  regarded  the  preacher  out 
of  closing  eyes,  and  let  their  heads  sink  more  and  more 
towards  the  support  of  their  shoulders.  But  for  the 
languor  in  their  faces  they  might  have  been  carved  out 
of  ebony. 

In  almost  every  case  the  skull  was  small  and  narrow, 
the  cheek-bones  projected  far  beyond  the  temples,  and 
the  jowl  was  full-rounded.  The  mouths  were  firm  but 
without  energy,  compressed  in  a  bitter  resignation  and  a 
settled  lethargy.  In  the  eyes,  some  of  them  handsome 
enough,  I  could  see  neither  intelligence  nor  cunning; 
here  and  there  one  noticed  the  beginnings,  but  only  the 
beginnings,  of  craft.  It  seemed  to  me  that  these  big, 
black-faced,  small-skulled,  and  weary-eyed  prisoners,  be- 
longed rather  to  some  species  of  torpid  animals  than 
to  the  most  wicked  or  the  most  stupid  races  of  hu- 
manity. 

A  Native  girl,  rescued  by  the  Salvation  Army  from  a 
famine  district,  and  trained  throughout  childhood  in  the 
methods  of  the  Army,  stood  under  the  shade  of  the 
tamarinds  and  spoke  in  a  most  gracious  and  winning  way 
to  the  crouching  prisoners  of  God's  love  for  men  and 
His  yearning  to  bestow  peace  and  happiness  upon  all 


THE  DOMS 


299 


those  who  will  seek  His  blessing.  Her  voice  was  exceed- 
ingly musical,  she  had  the  gentlest  of  kind  eyes,  her  ges- 
tures were  all  tender  and  compelling  —  but  there  was  no 
response  from  the  prisoners  —  absolutely  no  response  of 
any  kind. 

After  another  hymn,  a  vigorous  address  by  the  Salva- 
tionist, in  which  he  told  of  the  worst  men  in  England 
changed  in  a  second  by  conversion  from  misery  to  joy, 
and  a  closing  prayer,  I  was  invited  to  walk  round  the 
horseshoe  of  captives  and  ask  them  any  questions  I  might 
like.  For  the  first  time  I  detected  something  of  intelli- 
gence in  these  poor  miserable  men.  They  seemed  to  re- 
gard me  as  a  Sahib  of  the  Government  with  power  to 
unlock  their  prison  doors.  Every  one  to  whom  I  spoke 
seemed  to  rouse  some  drowning  intelligence  in  his  brain 
and  professed  his  wish  to  enter  the  Settlement  and  live 
a  law-abiding  life  —  not  w^ith  any  enthusiasm,  not  with 
any  repentance  for  the  past,  but  with  a  tired  effort  to 
convince  me  that  they  were  sick  to  death  of  their  condi- 
tion. 

It  came  to  me  that  perhaps  in  the  silence  of  their  hearts 
these  children  of  savagery  against  whom  the  centuries 
have  sinned  so  long  and  grievously,  put  the  God  of  Chris- 
tianity to  a  test,  and  pray  for  deliverance.  Suppose  that 
they  do  this?  They  are  told  that  He  has  only  to  be 
asked  for  mercy  and  that  mercy  will  come  to  them. 
They  are  told  that  He  is  all-powerful  and  that  there  is 
nothing  that  He  cannot  do.  Suppose  they  pray  to  Him. 
Suppose,  with  the  dull  cunning  of  animals,  they  put  this 
new  God  to  a  test.  "  Take  me  out  of  prison,  place  me 
in  the  Salvation  Army,  do  not  let  me  spend  any  more 
years  in  this  cruel  prison."     And  then,  when  the  Sal- 


300  OTHER  SHEEP 

vationists  come  to  them  on  Sunday,  and  they  say  — 
"We  want  to  be  good;  let  us  come  into  the  Settlement 
and  we  will  worship  your  God  " —  they  must  be  told, 
"  there  is  six  months  more  of  your  sentence  still  to  run." 
What  a  God !  —  a  God  who  cannot  even  deliver  a  man 
from  an  unjust  sentence  of  imprisonment!  —  a  God 
Who  is  said  to  be  a  worker  of  wonders,  an  almighty  and 
great  God  Who  must  wait  upon  the  police  before  He  can 
act! 

One  often  thinks  when  a  clergyman  reads  in  Church 
with  dramatic  energy  the  wonderful  chapter  in  which 
Elijah  challenged  the  priests  of  Baal  to  a  conflict  in 
magic,  how  hard  it  would  fare  with  him  if  some 
atheist  rose  and  challenged  him  to  a  conflict  of  the  same 
kind. 

The  Doms  are  so  simple  and  primitive  as  to  be  scarcely 
human.  To  make  them  realize  the  existence  of  a  God 
is  extraordinarily  diflicult;  to  make  them  grasp  the 
idea  of  a  God  Who  is  at  one  and  the  same  time  per- 
fect Love  and  unalterable  Law,  is,  I  should  say,  impossi- 
ble. As  I  looked  at  them  during  this  service  I  wondered 
what  Pascal  would  say  of  them,  or  Bossuet,  or  Bishop 
Butler,  or  the  latest  popular  preacher  in  New  York. 
Are  they,  indeed,  children  of  God  and  heirs  of  eternal 
life?  Do  they  represent  the  race  against  which  Satan 
directs  the  artillery  of  hell  and  for  which  the  innocent 
Christ  offered  up  His  life  on  the  cross?  Or  are  they 
vestiges  of  humanity's  brute  origin?  Men  who  have 
never  fallen,  and  men  who  have  never  risen;  creatures 
who  must  be  lifted  by  education  and  science  into  the 
kingdom  of  civilization  before  they  can  understand  the 


THE  DOMS  301 

alphabet  of  religion  and  take  a  first  step  into  the  King- 
dom of  God? 

One  thing  to  me  is  wholly  certain.  The  prison  system 
can  help  in  no  single  way  to  make  these  miserable  sav- 
ages intelligent  human  beings.  It  is  a  monstrous  sys- 
tem. Lock  men  up  by  all  means,  keep  them  in  your 
power,  and  feed  them  with  the  same  care  that  a  wise  man 
gives  to  his  horse  and  his  dog,  but  in  the  name  of  com- 
mon sense  do  not  shut  them  out  from  the  influences  of 
useful  work,  animal  companions,  healthy  games,  litera- 
ture, art,  science,  and  human  kindness.  I  cannot  think 
how  men  can  be  so  stupid  as  to  allow  the  present  prison 
system  to  continue  for  another  day,  unless  it  is  the  effect 
of  that  fear  and  distrust  of  our  fellow  creatures  which  is 
the  foundation  of  all  conservatism  and  the  solidest  ob- 
struction to  all  progress.  No  one,  I  am  sure,  could  doubt 
for  a  moment  after  a  visit  to  the  Dom  Settlement,  where 
a  single  Scotsman  and  his  wife  perfectly  control  an  army 
of  barbarians,  that  if  all  the  prisons  of  England  and 
India,  nay,  of  all  the  world,  were  given  into  the  keeping 
of  the  Salvation  Army  the  regeneration  of  the  Criminal 
Classes  would  be  accomplished  in  a  few  decades.  It  is 
not  enough  to  supplant  the  military  governor  by  the 
trained  Doctor  and  the  schoolmaster ;  something  is  needed 
which  science  does  not  possess  and  education  cannot  cre- 
ate to  order  —  that  wonderful  enthusiasm  for  humanity, 
that  unquestioning  belief  in  human  perfectability,  that 
absolute  faith  in  the  love  and  mercy  of  God,  which  are 
only  to  be  found  among  those  to  whom  religion  is  a 
personal  experience.  Crude  to  us  the  method  of  the  Sal- 
vation Army  may  appear;  it  may  grate  upon  our  senses 


302  OTHER  SHEEP 

and  strike  jangling  discords  across  the  stately  music  of 
our  spiritual  life;  but  this  Army  has  the  secret  of  saving 
men.  It  has  "  an  unlimited  fund  of  enthusiasm,"  and 
its  "  influence  is  personal  and  humanizing."  No  finer 
testimonial  was  ever  given  to  the  Salvation  Army  than 
the  statement  of  Mr.  Burn  in  India :  "  They  live  among 
the  people  and  enter  into  their  lives." 

I  have  seen  this  work  and  I  bear  witness  to  it. 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER 

"  Kind  words,"  says  Faber,  in  a  charming  phrase,  "  are 
the  music  of  the  world;  they  have  a  power  which  seems 
to  be  beyond  natural  causes."  It  is  the  mystery  of  kind 
words  that  they  do  not  need,  like  the  delicate  seeds  of 
a  rare  plant,  to  have  the  ground  prepared  for  them ;  they 
break  into  flower  even  as  they  fall,  and  whatever  may 
be  the  nature  of  the  soil.  A  nocturne  by  Chopin,  a  land- 
scape b}^  Claude,  a  sonnet  by  Shakespeare  —  these  things 
demand  even  among  the  civilized  and  refined  something 
beautiful  in  the  soul  before  their  appeal  can  become  irre- 
sistible; but  a  kind  word  may  arrest  a  brutal  nature  in 
the  very  commission  of  a  crime  or  literally  create  a  new 
spirit  in  the  mind  of  a  savage.  It  is  astonishing  that 
this  power  of  kindness  has  not  been  put  to  greater  use_ 
among  the  law-makers  of  humanity  in  their  hard  task  of 
elevating  those  great  masses  of  men  dragging  everywhere 
like  a  dead  weight  on  the  skirts  of  progress.  Philan- 
thropy is  not  a  hobby  of  the  sentimental,  it  is  a  power  of 
unparalleled  force  in  the  mechanism  of  evolution.  One 
has  only  to  consider  the  extraordinary  results  of  a  few 
years'  experience  among  the  Criminal  Tribes  of  India 
by  a  religious  organization  which  relies  on  kindness  and 
kindness  alone  for  its  redemptive  work,  to  realize  how 
victorious  is  this  energy  of  the  soul,  and  of  what  vast 
service  it  might  be  to  the  general  progress  of  mankind. 
For  these  Criminal  Tribes  are  not  only  willing  to  enter 

303 


■304  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  settlements  of  the  Salvation  Army,  they  are  every- 
where clamouring  to  be  admitted.  I  cannot  easily  for- 
get the  pathetic  appeal  made  to  me  by  a  Bhatu  of  Mo- 
radabad  —  an  appeal  made  by  the  eyes  and  the  hands  — 
as  he  knelt  before  me,  beseeching  that  I  should  get  him 
admitted  to  the  crowded  and  over-crowded  Settlement  of 
his  tribe.  And  soon  after  I  had  left  Moradabad,  I  heard 
from  the  admirable  Brigadier  in  charge  of  the  work,  an 
Indian,  that  an  army  of  several  hundreds  of  these  people 
were  then  on  the  march  to  the  Settlement,  the  w4ves  carry- 
ing babies,  the  husbands  can-ying  young  children,  and 
the  older  children  carrying  the  family  possessions  — • 
marching  by  night,  and  hiding  in  the  jungle  by  day,  for 
fear  that  the  police  might  intercept  them  and  drive  them 
back.  It  is  a  pitiful  thing,  a  terribly  pitiful  thing,  that 
these  harried  and  much  enduring  people,  who  go  down 
on  their  knees  imploring  the  Salvation  Army  to  take 
them,  should  have  to  be  repulsed  simply  for  want  of  a 
little  money.  The  Government  has  done  all  it  can  do, 
in  giving  land  and  buildings  and  making  grants;  but 
much  more  money  will  be  needed  —  and  one  hopes  that 
the  rich  men  of  India  as  well  as  the  rich  people  in  Eng- 
land and  America  may  realize  it  —  before  all  these  mil- 
lions of  useless,  profitless,  and  suffering  humanity  can  be 
brought  within  the  pale  of  civilization  and  made  a  bless- 
ing to  humanity. 

While  the  man  of  whom  I  have  spoken  knelt  before 
me,  a  much  pleasanter-looking  Bhatu,  indeed  a  rather 
noble  specimen  of  mankind,  sat  on  one  of  the  stairs  de- 
scending from  the  veranda  of  the  Settlement's  head- 
quarters —  once  a  palace  —  and  told  me  about  his  peo- 
ple and  himself.     It  was  an  afternoon  of  insufferable 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       305 

heat;  an  old  fellow  stood  behind  my  chair  beating  the 
flies  away  from  me  with  a  cloth,  and  in  my  hands  I  held 
a  tumbler  of  constantly  replenished  lemon  water.  Be- 
fore me  were  the  two  Bhatus;  three  steps  lower  down 
sat  an  old  and  withered  woman,  an  elbow  resting  on  her 
knee,  her  face  lying  in  the  cup  of  her  hand,  her  eyes 
watching  me,  her  lips  mumbling  a  monotonous  solilo- 
quy. Beyond  us,  at  the  bottom  of  the  high  veranda  on 
which  we  sat,  stretched  the  dusty  compound,  shimmer- 
ing in  the  blinding  sunlight  and  patched  by  the  pale 
shadows  of  listless  trees.  And  from  every  point  in  that 
compound  came  the  cackle  of  fowls,  for  the  Brigadier's 
.wife  is  an  expert  in  poultry,  and  from  behind  us  in  the 
cool  shades  of  the  large  house  came  the  rattle  of  the 
looms,  where  the  Bhatus  were  at  w^ork  as  weavers. 

The  handsome  *Bhatu  said  to  me,  "  Our  people  were  a 
race  of  soldiers.  We  served  a  mighty  Rajah,  who  gave 
us  many  lands,  and  we  were  rich.  Once  we  refused  to 
fight  for  him;  our  lands  were  taken  from  us  and  we 
became  a  wandering  people.  That  is  a  long  time  ago. 
Since  then  our  people  have  been  dacoits  and  outcasts. 
There  has  been  no  place  where  we  could  rest.  Our  suf- 
ferings have  been  very  great.  The  police  used  to  make 
our  women  do  what  they  asked;  if  w^e  resisted  they 
placed  brass  pots  in  our  camps  and  we  were  arrested  for 
stealing.  You  must  do  what  the  police  tell  you,  right 
or  wrong,  or  you  go  to  jail.  It  is  not  safe  for  a  Bhatu 
outside  the  Settlement." 

I  asked  him'  about  the  religion  of  the  Bhatus.  "  We 
know  there  is  a  God,  but  we  do  not  know  anything 
about  Him.  We  do  not  know  what  He  wants.  Our 
bhagats   (fakirs,  or  holy  men)  know  something  about 


3o6  OTHER  SHEEP 

the  devils.  x\fter  death  we  live  in  another  world,  but  we 
do  not  know  what  it  is  like.  We  do  not  think  much 
about  these  things.  Mostly  we  talk  about  stealing  and 
fighting  and  the  police." 

"  Do  you  worship  your  ancestors  ?  "  I  asked. 

"  No !  "  he  answered  emphatically.  "  We  are  very 
angry  with  our  ancestors.  All  our  troubles  have  come 
from  them.  If  they  had  fought  for  the  great  Rajah  we 
should  not  have  suffered.  And  for  many  years  all  our 
ancestors  have  been  dacoits.  There  are  boys  of  twelve 
among  our  people  who  are  first-rate  dacoits.  They  can 
attack  a  man  in  the  dark  and  rob  him.  They  can  take 
jewels  from  women.  They  learn  from  their  fathers, 
and  they  are  not  afraid.  We  think  our  fathers  have  led 
us  into  wrong.  We  know  that  dacoiting  is  wrong  be- 
cause we  get  sent  to  jail." 

The  Brigadier  in  charge  of  this  work,  who  acted  as 
interpreter,  said  to  me :  "  The  Bhatus  have  a  very  bad 
name,  especially  the  women.  The  women  are  dancers, 
beggars,  and  prostitutes.  The  men  are  fearless  and  very 
cunning.  A  police  superintendent  told  me  that  with 
five  Bhatus  he  would  storm  any  village  in  India.  They 
are  audacious,  strong,  and  extraordinarily  ferocious. 
They  fight  with  two  long  sticks  in  their  hands.  They  ap- 
proach an  adversary  carrying  both  these  sticks,  and  from 
either  hand  fling  one  at  his  face  with  frightful  force, 
and  then  spring  upon  him  with  the  other.  While  the 
women  dance  or  beg,  the  men  go  into  the  jungle  and 
hunt  for  pig  and  deer.  They  are  a  bold  people,  rather 
a  proud  people;  but  they  are  perfectly  amenable  to  dis- 
cipline when  they  are  sure  of  kindly  treatment." 

The   Bhatu   told   me    about   marriage    customs.     He 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       307 

said  that  the  women  are  more  numerous  among  Bhatus 
than  the  men,  the  opposite  condition  of  things  to  that 
which  obtains  among  the  Haburas,  a  tribe  presently  to 
be  considered.  They  are  very  strict  about  their  mar- 
riage ceremony,  even  when  the  bride  is  a  professional 
woman.  Everything  must  be  done  with  much  pomp  and 
in  due  order.  No  one  can  be  married  without  a  feast. 
Parents  demand  as  much  as  four  hundred  rupees  for  a 
daughter,  but  the  money  is  generally  spent  in  a  ceremo- 
nial debauch  of  which  the  bridegroom,  and  his  relations 
are  careful  to  obtain  an  adequate  share.  They  drink 
country  arrack  at  these  festivals,  but  it  is  only  at  wed- 
dings that  they  give  way  to  drink  with  intemperance. 
To  get  a  young  girl  for  his  wife  is  the  chief  desire  of 
a  Bhatu,  and  when  he  has  saved  enough  money  for  this 
purpose  his  chief  occupation  is  to  guard  his  possession 
from  the  police. 

The  reader  may  remember  that  I  quoted  Sir  Bamfylde 
Fuller  as  saying  that  certain  thieves  in  India  can  steal 
the  bedclothes  from  a  sleeper.  As  the  Bhatus  are  ex- 
pert and  most  daring  burglars,  and  as  I  had  established 
a  complete  confidence  with  my  friend  on  the  veranda, 
I  asked  him  through  the  interpreter  to  tell  us  how  these 
burglaries  are  committed  —  to  tell  us  the  secret  of  these 
extraordinary  visitations.  While  he  was  speaking,  after 
a  consultation  with  the  poor  fellow  clamouring  to  be 
admitted  to  the  Settlement,  the  old  woman  flashed  angry 
eyes  at  him  and  muttered  in  far  louder  tones  her  myste- 
rious and  never  interrupted  soliloquy. 

He  told  me  that  the  burglars  go  to  a  burying  ground 
where  a  dead  virgin  has  lately  been  given  to  the  flames, 
and  carefully  collect  a  portion  of  her  ashes,  these  ashes 


3o8  OTHER  SHEEP 

they  take  to  their  bhagat,  or  magician,  who  performs 
certain  ceremonies  over  them,  and  returns  them  to  the 
burglars.  The  ashes  are  now  ready  for  use.  "  We  go 
to  a  house,"  said  the  Bhatu,  "  enter  it  very  carefully, 
and  sprinkle  these  ashes  on  the  faces  of  the  sleepers. 
We  have  to  be  very  careful  not  to  make  the  slightest 
noise  in  entering  the  house,  but  as  soon  as  we  have 
sprinkled  the  ashes  we  may  make  just  as  much  noise 
as  we  like;  the  sleepers  will  not  wake  till  the  spell  is 
worn  off  in  the  morning." 

He  was  perfectly  natural  in  this  narration,  and  it  was 
evident  from  the  anger  and  annoyance  in  the  eyes  of 
thei  withered  old  woman  on  the  steps  below  him,  that  he 
was  telling  me  a  genuine  secret  of  his  people;  but  it 
seemed  so  incredible  that  the  ashes  of  a  virgin  could  act 
in  this  magical  fashion  and  I  was  so  sure  of  being  im- 
posed upon,  that  I  turned  to  the  Native  Salvationist  with 
a  smile  and  asked  him  what  he  thought  of  the  tale. 

To  my  surprise  I  found  that  the  Salvationist  was  not 
smiling,  on  the  contrary  that  he  was  grave  and  thought- 
ful. He  answered  my  question  in  these  words,  "  I  have 
never  heard  this  account  before;  it  seems  to  me  im- 
possible to  be  true,  but  it  makes  me  think,  because  in  two 
or  three  recent  burglaries  the  police  have  found  a  green- 
ish-grey ash  scattered  about  the  house,  particularly  round 
the  beds  where  people  have  slept." 

Now,  it  is  possible  that  the  bhagat  is  not  content  with 
ceremonial  rites  when  he  handles  the  ashes,  and  that  he 
either  impregnates  them  with  a  powerful  narcotic  or  that 
he  substitutes  for  them  altogether  something  of  a  sopo- 
rific character;  however  that  may  be,  it  is  interesting  to 
bear   in  mind  that  both   Dr.   Frazer  and   Mr.   Edgar 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       309 

Thurston  give  many  instances  in  their  books  of  the  sav- 
age beHef  in  the  virtue  of  almost  everything  attaching 
to  a  virgin  —  from  a  drop  of  her  blood  to  her  ashes 
after  death.  And  Mr.  Thurston,  who  probably  knows 
more  about  the  primitive  peoples  of  Southern  India  than 
any  man  now  living,  tells  me  that  in  certain  districts  a 
pregnant  woman  is  very  often  attacked  and  murdered 
for  the  sake  of  that  which  she  carries,  and  that  the  buried 
bodies  of  little  girls  are  constantly  dug  up  because  of 
the  magical  value  attached  to  everything  about  them. 

The  Indian  Brigadier  in  charge  of  the  Bhatu  Settle- 
ment is  a  man  of  culture  whose  mind  is  governed  by  lib- 
eral ideas.  He  is  a  man,  too,  of  practical  common  sense, 
with  unusual  powers  of  organization;  the  last  man  in  the 
world  to  attach  any  importance  to  the  superstitions  of 
uncivilized  peoples.  But  he  told  me  that  there  are  many 
things  in  the  practice  of  the  Criminal  Tribes  which  can- 
not be  satisfactorily  explained  on  natural  grounds:  and 
in  telling  me  the  story  of  his  own  life  he  referred  to  an 
incident  which  makes  it  certain  for  him  that  we  are  gov- 
erned more  than  we  yet  realize  by  invisible  forces. 

He  was  born  in  Southern  India  —  his  father  a  high- 
caste  Hindu  who  had  been  converted  to  Christianity  by 
the  American  Mission,  his  mother  a  Tamil  Christian. 
Soon  after  marriage  the  man  became  dissolute  and  in- 
temperate in  his  habits.  Two  children  were  born  of 
the  marriage,  and  the  poor  woman,  who  appears  to  have 
been  something  of  a  saint,  was  greatly  distressed  by  this 
degrading  and  ruinous  change  in  her  husband's  charac- 
ter. 

"  When  the  days  came,"  said  the  Brigadier,  "  that 
my  father  abandoned  himself  to  drink,  my  mother  used 


310  OTHER  SHEEP 

to  pray  for  him,  remaining  for  hours  upon  her  knees. 
One  night  she  had  a  dream.  She  dreamed  that  she  was 
in  the  jungle  with  my  sister,  then  a  child  in  the  arms. 
As  she  wandered  through  the  jungle,  very  distressed 
and  unhappy,  like  one  who  had  lost  her  way,  a  gharry 
suddenly  appeared  before  her  in  the  trees,  shining  with 
light,  the  horses  as  if  fashioned  from  fire;  and  in  the 
gharry  was  seated  an  old  man  with  a  beard  of  flowing 
white  and  garments  that  shone  like  the  horses.  She  was 
afraid,  and  stood  still,  holding  my  sister  to  her  breast. 
But  the  old  man  said  to  her,  '  Come  near,'  and  as  he 
spoke  she  lost  her  sense  of  dread,  and  moved  forward. 
Then  the  old  man  said  to  her,  '  Be  at  peace,  and  do  not 
distress  yourself;  in  three  years  and  three  months  it  will 
be  well  with  you.'  Then  he  vanished  from  her  sight. 
When  she  woke  in  the  morning  the  impression  of  this 
dream  was  so  vivid  that  it  was  as  if  she  had  truly  been 
in  the  jungle  and  had  actually  seen  the  old  man  and 
heard  him  speak.  She  made  a  note  of  the  dream  and 
the  prophecy,  said  nothing  about  the  matter,  and  con- 
tinued her  daily  life  as  before.  My  father  became 
worse  and  worse;  the  prosperity  of  the  home  began  to 
dwindle;  my  poor  mother  never  knew  a  single  hour  of 
peace  and  hope;  in  fact,  you  could  scarcely  imagine  a 
home  more  wretched  and  more  threatened  with  ruin. 
This  state  of  things  continued  for  three  years  and  three 
months,  and  then  to  the  very  day,  my  father  disap- 
peared. Without  a  word,  without  a  hint,  without  a 
quarrel,  without  warning  of  any  kind,  he  vanished.  My 
mother  went  to  the  police,  and  to  the  mission:  every- 
thing was  done  to  discover  whether  he  was  alive  or 
dead,  but  no  information  could  be  got  of  any  kind.     It 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       311 

was  really  as  if  the  earth  had  opened  and  swallowed 
him  up.  From  that  day  to  this,  nearly  forty  years,  no 
news  has  been  forthcoming  as  to  what  happened  to  him. 
I  often  discussed  the  matter  with  my  mother  and  she 
was  always  perfectly  clear  that  the  day  of  his  disap- 
pearance fulfilled  the  prophecy  of  her  dream.  Both  she 
and  myself  were  struck  by  the  incongruousness  of  the 
gharry  in  this  dream,  but  my  mother  declared  emphatic- 
ally that  it  was  a  veritable  gharry,  and  not  a  chariot  or 
vehicle  of  a  more  striking  kind.  One  cannot  explain 
these  things.  They  happen;  we  are  surprised  by  them; 
and  we  go  on." 

The  disappearance  of  the  father  plunged  the  family 
into  poverty.  The  mother  dressed  as  a  widow,  gave 
up  the  use  of  flowers,  and  went  as  nurse  to  the  minister 
and  his  wife  in  charge  of  the  American  Mission.  This 
couple  appear  to  have  been  very  noble  people.  The 
Brigadier's  eyes  grew  tender  when  he  spoke  about  them. 
"  He  was  like  a  father  to  me,  and  she  was  a  second 
mother.  They  loved  us,  my  sister  and  myself,  and  they 
gave  themselves  to  us  as  if  we  had  been  their  own  chil- 
dren." The  boy  was  clever  and  passed  from  the  mis- 
sion school  to  the  higher  education  of  a  college  course. 
I  have  not  seen  a  Native  of  India  with  a  finer  shaped 
head,  or  more  intelligent  eyes;  but  for  his  dark  skin  he 
would  pass  for  a  typical  French  savant  —  a  bright, 
rapid,  and  vivacious  intelligence.  While  he  was  at  col- 
lege, the  missionaries  were  obliged  to  return  to  America. 
He  went  to  see  them  off  from  Madras,  and  so  great  was 
his  grief  at  parting  from  them  that  he  could  not  restrain 
his  tears.  While  he  stood  there,  vainly  struggling  to 
restrain  his  grief,  he  saw  some  Europeans  dressed  in 


312  OTHER  SHEEP 

JSTative  clothes,  two  women  and  a  man,  who  attracted 
his  attention  even  in  his  grief;  he  saw  them  through  his 
tears.  After  parting  from  his  friends,  he  wandered 
wretchedly  through  the  streets  of  Madras,  like  a  dog 
bereft  of  his  master.  Darkness  fell  on  the  city,  and  still 
he  could  not  bear  to  go  back  to  college.  As  he  entered 
a  certain  street  he  saw  a  hall  into  which  people  were 
passing  as  if  for  a  meeting.  He  approached  the  door, 
looked  in,  and  saw  the  three  Europeans  in  Native  dress 
who  had  attracted  his  attention  a  few  hours  before. 
Struck  by  the  coincidence,  and  curious  to  discover  who 
they  were,  he  entered  the  hall. 

"  I  had  no  knowledge  at  that  time,"  he  told  me,  "of 
the  Salvation  Army,  and  this  meeting  made  a  very  great 
impression  on  my  mind.  I  was  struck  by  the  earnest- 
ness and  sincerity  of  the  Salvationists.  I  also  felt  a  lack 
in  myself  of  something  which  was  essential  to  my  peace 
of  mind.  For  many  weeks  and  months  afterwards  I 
was  haunted  by  the  picture  of  those  three  people  on  the 
platform,  indeed  it  is  an  ineffaceable  impression  to  this 
day.  I  was  extremely  wretched  and  unhappy.  I 
missed  my  American  missionaries  with  my  whole  heart, 
and  I  was  fighting  against  sin.  I  was  about  eighteen 
years  of  age;  and  although  I  was  pure,  and  had  no 
impulse  at  all  towards  immorality,  I  was  so  quick- 
tempered and  so  ungoverned  in  my  anger,  that  I  felt  in 
.despair  about  myself.  It  is  curious  that  I  was  of  a  very 
shy  and  retiring  disposition;  not  a  man,  one  would  say, 
to  fly  in  a  passion  and  lose  control  of  himself.  But  so  it 
was.  The  least  opposition  or  annoyance  flung  me  into 
a  rage,  and  in  a  rage  I  was  capable  of  anything  —  vio- 
lence and  ferocity  of  a  dreadful  nature.     I  used  to  go 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       313 

into  the  hills  and  pray;  I  was  very  constant  in  my  at- 
tendance at  church.  I  wanted  to  feel  that  God  was 
near  me;  that  He  was  not  afar  off;  that  He  was  not  half 
real,  but  actually  real,  and  close  at  my  heart  to  strengthen 
my  better  resolutions  and  guard  me  against  anger. 

"  I  must  confess  to  you  that  I  had  inherited  some- 
thing of  Hinduism  in  my  nature.  The  Hindu  religion 
teaches  that  a  man  must  work  out  his  own  salvation, 
that  escape  from  existence  can  only  be  won  by  the  work 
of  the  man  himself,  it  is  he  w^ho  must  do  everything. 
Now,  although  I  had  faith  in  God,  and  although  my  ob- 
ject was  the  very  opposite  of  the  Hindu  religion,  I  w^as 
yet  trying  to  reach  my  goal  by  the  same  methods. 
Nothing  that  I  had  learned  from  the  American  Mission 
gave  me  any  other  conception  of  the  Christian  religion. 
I  thought  I  could  win  God.  Not  till  later  in  my  life  did 
the  truth  flash  upon  the  darkness  of  my  soul  like  a  great 
light  —  the  truth  that  consciousness  of  God  and  free- 
dom from  sin  are  not  to  be  won  by  effort,  or  by  formality 
of  any  kind  —  but  by  receptiveness  of  the  heart. 

"  This  truth  came  to  me  when  I  was  staying  with  my 
sister,  who  had  married  a  Native  clergyman.  I  met  at 
her  house  a  Salvationist,  a  relation  of  her  husband.  The 
sight  of  the  uniform  revived  in  my  mind  the  picture  of 
the  meeting  in  Madras,  and  I  was  conscious  at  once  of 
a  singular,  I  may  really  say  a  magnetic  attraction  in  the 
man.  So  great  indeed  was  the  attraction  of  this  Sal- 
vationist, he  was  a  Hindu,  that  I  told  him  all  my  trou- 
bles that  very  evening,  and  after  he  had  comforted  and 
encouraged  me,  we  spent  the  whole  night  on  our  knees 
praying  to  God  for  illumination.  It  came  at  daybreak. 
Quite  quietly  and  naturally,  but  with  a  sense  of  serenity 


314  OTHER  SHEEP 

for  my  heart  that  I  cannot  express  to  you,  the  light  en- 
tered, and  I  saw  that  God  loves  a  man  in  spite  of  his 
sins  and  in  spite  of  his  failures.  It  was  this  wonderful 
knowledge  that  God  really  had  love  for  me,  that  His 
attitude  towards  me  was  that  of  a  father,  irrespective 
altogether  of  what  I  was,  in  spite  altogether  of  my  sins 
—  it  was  this  knowledge  that  entered  into  my  troubled 
soul  and  into  my  exhausted  heart,  just  like  a  Voice 
breathing  the  words  of  Christ,  Peace  he  still.  My  relief 
was  so  great  that  I  rose  up  and  said,  '  He  has  given  me 
His  love.  I  know  now  the  only  happiness,  the  only  sat- 
isfaction.' 

"  Instead  now  of  dwelling  on  myself,  and  striving  to 
make  my  own  way,  I  thought  instantly  of  others,  and 
longed  to  share  with  them  the  knowledge  of  God  which 
had  given  such  wonderful  and  beautiful  peace  to  my 
own  soul.  But  when  I  spoke  to  my  sister  and  my 
brother-in-law  about  becoming  a  Salvationist  they  op- 
posed the  idea.  My  brother-in-law  said  to  me,  '  This  is 
only  an  emotion;  it  will  wear  off;  you  will  be  sorry  if 
you  take  a  step  such  as  you  contemplate  in  your  natural 
excitement.'  The  Salvation  Army  meant  poverty,  and 
in  those  days  it  also  meant  ostracism.  The  other  mis- 
sions disliked  its  methods,  and  Government  officials  felt 
greatly  annoyed  by  the  appearance  of  Europeans  in  our 
Indian  costume.  My  mother  implored  me  not  to  throw 
away  my  life.  I  was  taken  to  village  meetings,  and  my 
brother-in-law  held  out  to  me  the  prospect  of  becoming 
a  respectable  clergyman  with  a  decent  income  and  a 
comfortable  house.  I  was  influenced  by  these  ideas,  but 
I  still  wanted  to  be  a  Salvationist,  because  I  felt  there 
was   no   utter   happiness   and   no   complete   satisfaction 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       315 

without  a  total  surrender  of  the  soul  to  a  life  of  self-sac- 
rifice. However,  I  let  them  arrange  for  me  to  enter  a 
theological  college,  and  started  off  one  day  to  enter  on 
my  training  for  a  clergyman.  By  some  miscalculation  I 
arrived  a  day  too  soon,  and  having  nothing  to  do  I  jour- 
neyed to  the  town  where  my  sister  was  living  that  I 
might  spend  the  afternoon  with  her.  There  in  her  house 
I  met  the  Salvationist  who  had  so  greatly  influenced  me 
and  who  had  brought  me  to  a  true  knowledge  of  God. 
It  was  a  difficult  moment  for  all  of  us.  My  sister  and 
my  mother  had  carefully  kept  us  apart;  I  had  never  seen 
him  nor  heard  from  him  since  our  first  meeting;  and 
now,  just  as  I  was  about  to  begin  my  training  for  the 
Church,  we  encountered.  During  the  time  I  was  at  the 
house  we  were  never  left  alone  together,  and  I  could  see 
that  my  brother-in-law  was  determined  to  save  me  from 
the  man's  influence.  But  when  he  came  to  go  for  bul- 
lock-carts, it  was  discovered  that  only  one  could  be 
found,  and  so  in  spite  of  all  their  precautions,  I  and  the 
Salvationist  were  obliged  to  travel  together.  I  am  more 
grateful  than  I  can  tell  you  that  there  was  only  one 
bullock-cart  to  be  had  that  night.  For  as  we  journeyed 
together,  the  man's  magnetism  overcame  me,  all  my  en- 
thusiasm revived,  and  I  felt  as  sure  as  I  have  felt  of 
anything  in  my  life,  that  God's  Will  with  me  was  that 
I  should  become  a  Salvationist.  Instead  of  going  to  the 
theological  college,  I  went  straight  to  Madras,  and  of- 
fered myself  to  the  Army.  Some  weeks  afterwards 
while  I  was  at  a  meeting  a  message  came  that  I  was 
wanted  outside,  and  going  to  the  door  I  found  a  well- 
known  missionary  waiting  to  speak  to  me.  He  was  one 
of  the  best  missionaries  in  India,  a  man  of  extraordinary 


3i6  OTHER  SHEEP 

goodness,  and  one  who  had  exercised  a  certain  charm 
over  my  mind.  He  came,  at  the  wish  of  my  mother  and 
my  brother-in-law,  to  beg  me  to  enter  the  theological 
college  and  to  consecrate  my  life  to  the  ministry  of  the 
American  mission.  We  spoke  together  for  fifteen  min- 
utes. How  I  answered  him  I  do  not  remember  now;  it 
is  all  like  a  dream :  but  I  know  that  he  returned  to  my 
sister  and  my  brother-in-law,  and  said  to  them,  "  You 
must  let  him  be;  he  has  been  called  by  God."  And 
since  that  day  I  have  never  known  unhappiness  or  dis- 
satisfaction. I  have  lived  every  hour.  Wherever  I 
have  been  sent  I  have  found  a  sphere  of  usefulness,  and 
now,  in  charge  of  this  Settlement,  I  am  happier  than  I 
have  ever  been  —  my  one  distress  that  we  have  not  more 
money  to  take  more  of  these  poor  Bhatus  into  our  care." 

The  Settlement  is  one  for  which  Fakir  Singh  has  a 
particular  affection,  and  the  least  imaginative  man,  I 
think,  could  not  fail  to  be  struck  if  he  saw  these  Bhatus, 
these  former  murderers,  burglars,  and  dacoits,  working 
intelligently  at  the  looms,  peacefully  cultivating  the  land, 
and  learning  with  pleasure  and  delight  to  be  dairymen 
and  poultry-keepers,  under  the  spell  of  kindness  and  the 
magic  of  Christian  love. 

The  Brigadier  is  not  a  man  to  exaggerate  or  to 
prophesy  millennial  bliss.  He  acknowledges  that  to 
make  some  of  the  older  Bhatus  understand  Christianity 
is  impossible.  He  does  not  anticipate  that  he  will  soon 
be  in  a  position  to  flourish  the  announcement  of  whole- 
sale conversions  among  the  Bhatus  in  the  delighted  faces 
of  a  pious  missionary-supporting  public  in  America  and 
England.  But  he  is  convinced,  with  no  shadow  of  mis- 
giving,   that   kindness   can   reclaim    these   people    from 


THE  BHATUS  AND  A  BRIGADIER       317 

crime  and  barbarism,  that  a  few  years  will  suffice  to 
make  the  Settlement  a  self-supporting  colony  of  man- 
ufacture and  agriculture,  and  that  education  and  the  in- 
fluence of  Christianity  will  convert  the  whole  of  the  next 
generation  to  moral  ideas  and  the  standards  of  civiliza- 
tion. 

I  visited  the  looms  and  purchased  some  of  the 
products,  which  are  now  pronounced  to  be  by  an  exact- 
ing housekeeper,  of  a  very  good  quality.  The  men  at 
the  looms  appeared  to  me  a  fine  and  handsome  race,  a 
race  of  beings  no  whit  inferior  to  any  of  the  peoples  of 
India  except  some  of  the  highest  Brahmans,  Parsis,  and 
certain  of  the  hill  tribes.  They  have  a  manly  and  vigor- 
ous look,  hold  themselves  well,  and  are  not  sleepy,  dull 
and  torpid  with  that  inhuman  inertness  of  the  Doms.  I 
imagine  that  under  the  care  of  such  a  man  as  the  Briga- 
dier there  will  be  no  difficulty  in  bringing  these  intelli- 
gent, courageous,  and  energetic  people  into  the  first 
ranks  of  Indian  humanity. 

"  I  find,"  he  said,  *'  that  they  are  anxious  to  learn 
weaving,  and  that  they  soon  grasp  the  difficulties  of  that 
trade.  Indeed,  I  should  say  that  they  were  unusually 
quick  at  learning.  But  the  older  men,  and  the  women 
long  accustomed  to  a  life  of  prostitution,  are  only  anx- 
ious to  enter  the  Settlement  as  a  place  of  peace  and  se- 
curity. I  have  no  illusions  on  that  head.  Some  show 
a  keener  and  quicker  intelligence  than  others,  some  re- 
spond to  Christian  ideas  very  easily,  and  many  are  by 
nature  what  one  would  call  good  men  and  virtuous 
women.  In  fact,  they  are  a  mixed  body,  representing 
many  stages  of  human  progress.  But  who  can  doubt 
that  the  worst  as  well  as  the  best  of  them,  should  be 


3i8  OTHER  SHEEP 

delivered    from    their    wretched    and    useless    life    and 
helped  towards  something  which  is  at  least  consecrated 
'  by  Christianity  ?  " 

I  am  glad  to  say  that  the  people  of  Moradabad  now 
take  a  kindly  interest  in  the  Settlement,  and  that  the 
Brigadier  finds  he  can  dispose  of  almost  all  his  products 
among  the  European  community. 


THE  HABURAS  AND  A  CHOKIDAH 

A  MILE  or  two  from  Moradabad  is  the  Settlement,  pro- 
vided by  the  Government  and  managed  by  the  Salvation 
Army,  for  a  tribe  known  as  the  Haburas,  to  whom 
reference  was  made  in  the  last  chapter.  These  people 
are  almost  as  fierce  as  the  Bhatus  and  almost  as  animal 
as  the  Doms.  They  occupy  a  mid-way  position  between 
the  beastlike  races  of  man,  and  the  races  who  have  come 
by  audacity  and  valour  to  the  semblance  of  civilized  hu- 
manity. 

The  Settlement  lies  some  way  from  a  road,  and  in 
crossing  the  land  with  my  friend  the  Brigadier  — 
whose  name  of  Jivandham,  Joy  of  Life,  harmonized 
with  the  beautiful  morning  on  which  this  visit  was  paid 
—  I  saw  some  of  the  Haburas  at  work  in  the  fields.  A 
group  of  men,  cutting  down  a  tall  reed  grass  with  instru- 
ments resembling  our  bill-hooks,  attracted  my  notice,  but 
I  learned  with  surprise  that  they  were  not  Haburas. 
"We  have  to  employ  these  men,"  said  the  Brigadier; 
"  for  the  work  of  cutting  this  sharp  and  stubborn  reed 
is  beyond  the  skill  and  beyond  the  strength  of  the  Ha- 
buras." He  told  me  that  the  hands  of  the  Haburas  are 
as  soft  and  tender  as  children's  from  centuries  of  idle- 
ness, and  that  they  become  easily  disheartened  if  given 
work  which  taxes  their  strength  or  skill.  "  They  are  so 
backward,"  he  said,  "that  they  cannot  even  build  their 

319 


320  OTHER  SHEEP 

own  mud  houses;  we  have  to  employ  men  to  build  and 
repair  all  our  buildings.  As  for  this  reed,  it  is  not  a! 
serious  matter,  we  pay  piece  work,  and  the  sale  of  the 
reed  leaves  us  a  profit." 

Presently  we  passed  a  genuine  Haburah.  He  was  a 
small  old  man,  naked  save  for  his  loin  cloth,  and  so 
wrinkled  and  shrivelled  and  pathetic  that  one  could  not 
look  at  him  without  compassion.  He  was  seated  on  the 
ground,  his  little  legs  open,  and  with  a  scraping  instru- 
ment, was  scratching  and  dragging  from  the  land  be- 
tween his  feet,  a  small  plant  that  suggested  a  straggling 
carnation  root  fresh  from  the  nursery  and  very  much 
scorched  by  the  sun,  and  in  most  urgent  need  of  mois- 
ture. This  little  dried  up  plant  he  placed  in  a  bag  at  his 
side,  and  went  on  scraping  at  another.  I  learned  that 
this  is  a  plant  of  exceeding  value  in  India,  a  plant  hold- 
ing the  highest  honour  in  the  estimation  of  many  a  great 
Sahib  and  many  a  great  Rajah  —  for  it  is  the  diib  grass 
(cynodon  dactylon)  which  to  the  horse  in  India  is  what 
meadow  hay  is  to  the  horse  in  England.  "  We  sell  it 
in  Moradabad,"  said  the  Brigadier,  "  and  get  a  good 
price  for  it." 

The  shrivelled  old  man  on  the  ground  had  feet  and 
hands  as  narrow  as  any  girl  twelve  years  of  age.  It 
was  a  curious  contrast  to  look  from  these  pretty  ex- 
tremities—  the  soles  of  the  feet  and  palms  of  the  hands 
as  white  as  any  European's  —  to  the  bald  head,  the  fur- 
rowed brow,  the  dim  and  sunken  eyes,  the  indrawn  lips, 
and  curving  chin  of  his  withered  countenance.  I  was 
struck  by  the  extreme  dimness  of  his  eyes,  and  spoke  to 
the  Brigadier  about  their  condition.     He  addressed  a 


THE  HABURAS  AND  A  CHOKIDAH      321 

question  to  the  old  man,  and  then,  stooping  forward, 
lifting  a  lid,  and  tilting  up  the  head  so  that  the  sun 
struck  full  in  the  eye,  he  said,  "  He  is  almost  blind." 

We  continued  our  walk  across  the  land,  and  presently 
came  in  sight  of  what  seemed  to  be  a  mud  fort.  I  must 
explain  that  our  carriage  had  been  met  in  the  road  by  the 
chokidah  of  the  Settlement,  once  the  head  man  of  these 
Haburas,  and  this  man  had  insisted,  in  spite  of  my  wish 
to  leave  it  in  the  carriage,  on  carrying  a  heavy  coat 
which  I  had  been  wearing  on  account  of  the  cold. 
When  I  noticed  the  distance  which  still  lay  between  us 
and  the  Settlement,  the  sun  being  now  at  its  hottest,  and 
the  walk  of  a  good  heating  nature  in  spite  of  the  cold 
air  from  the  snow  mountains,  I  spoke  of  this  coat  to 
the  Brigadier  and  asked  whether  it  could  not  be  left  on 
the  ground  till  we  returned.  He  laughed  and  said,  "  Oh, 
the  chokidah  feels  no  weight,  I  assure  you;  have  you 
noticed  him?  "  I  turned  and  saw  that  the  man  was  liter- 
ally quivering  with  pride.  "  He  is  a  fine  fellow,"  said 
the  Brigadier,  "  by  far  the  best  of  the  Haburas,  and  to 
appear  in  the  Settlement  carrying  the  coat  of  a  white 
man,  will  be  an  event  of  great  consequence  to  him. 
Long  after  you  are  back  in  England,  he  will  remind  his 
people  that  he  carried  the  Sahib's  coat  through  the  vil- 
lage. When  you  think  that  a  year  or  two  ago  he  was 
a  dacoit,  probably  a  murderer,  it  is  rather  striking.  But 
these  Criminal  Tribes,  the  best  of  them  at  any  rate,  are 
like  that;  trust  them,  put  them  on  their  honour,  give 
them  authority;  and  they  are  splendid."  I  asked  him 
to  thank  the  chokidah  for  putting  himself  to  so  much 
trouble  on  my  account.     When  he  got  the  message,  he 


322  OTHER  SHEEP 

turned  to  me  with  eyes  that  flashed,  showed  me  white 
teeth  in  the  proudest  of  smiles,  and  salaamed  with  a 
grave  dignity. 

We  passed  through  the  gateway  of  the  Settlement  — 
a  most  rickety  and  fragile  pair  of  gates  like  magnified 
hurdles  —  and  greeted  by  a  Native  Salvationist  who 
lives  among  the  people  —  came  into  this  little  centre  of 
reclamation,  this  village  of  Haburas. 

The  place  was  like  a  good-sized  farmyard,  120  yards 
square,  with  the  difference  that  the  low  mud  hovels  en- 
closing it  were  not  for  animals  but  for  humanity.  Here 
and  there  in  the  centre  were  young  trees  bandaged  and 
swathed  in  reeds  to  protect  them  from  the  buffaloes  and 
goats  which  roamed  about  among  the  people.  Every- 
where one  saw  cocks  and  hens  of  a  rather  sorry  descrip- 
tion, and  dogs  of  no  description  at  all.  Against  the 
walls  of  the  houses  men  were  lying  in  a  half-sleep,  their 
eyes  blinking  in  the  sunlight.  In  the  entrances  to  the 
hovels  one  saw  mothers  searching  in  the  heads  of  their 
children  for  lice  and  fleas.  Little  naked  boys  dragging 
sticks  too  long  for  them  through  the  dust,  stopped  in 
their  dissipation  of  chasing  fowls,  to  stare  at  the  visit- 
ors. Some  of  the  children  wore  round  their  necks  a 
string  hanging  with  stones,  beads,  bones,  and  claws  — 
the  gift  of  their  priest;  they  were  all  horribly  dirty.  A 
man  came  towards  us  carrying  a  child  on  his  arm,  and 
leading  another  by  the  hand;  he  wore  the  most  pathetic 
expression  on  his  face,  bowed  himself  earthwards,  and 
then  looked  at  me  with  all  the  imploring  appeal  of  a 
practised  beggar  in  London  but  wedded  with  such  a 
poignancy  and  profundity  of  sincerity  that  I  was  touched 
to  the  heart.     "  He  wants  you  to  know,"  said  the  Na- 


THE  HABURAS  AND  A  CHOKIDAH      323 

tive  Salvationist,  "  that  his  wife  died  last  week,  and 
that  he  is  very  sad." 

An  old  man  rose  from  the  dust  as  we  approached 
him,  and  stood  before  me,  a  living  skeleton.  One  could 
have  said  every  bone  was  visible  in  his  body,  from  the 
knife-edged  ribs  to  the  most  delicate  tendons  in  the 
wrist.  Such  poverty  of  body  I  have  seen  but  once  before ; 
such  age  but  seldom ;  such  living  death  never.  He  stood 
there,  his  arms  extended  from  the  side,  his  hands  open, 
his  almost  invisible  eyes  peering  at  me  from  the  depths 
of  the  sockets,  the  hairless  skull  bowed  towards  his 
breast.     It  was  his  welcome. 

"  This  man,"  said  the  young  Salvationist,  "  is  very 
old.     He  remembers  the  Mutiny." 

I  noticed  a  brown  string  bound  tightly  round  his 
wrist,  so  that  it  was  almost  buried  in  the  withered  skin. 
"  How  did  he  come  by  that  string?  "  I  asked.  The  old 
man  told  the  Salvationist  in  a  quavering  voice  that  it 
had  been  tied  there  by  the  priest  as  a  cure  for  spleen. 
I  asked  some  questions  about  his  life,  and  standing 
there  in  the  sunshine  and  the  dust,  with  his  chest  curved 
inward,  his  knees  standing  far  over,  and  his  pathetic 
arms  hanging  feebly  at  his  sides,  he  told  us  what  he 
could  remember  of  the  past.  He  was  born,  he  said, 
when  the  tribe  was  on  a  long  march.  He  remembers 
that  as  a  child  he  lived  in  villages,  jungle  villages,  but 
that  as  he  grew  older  he  was  always  marching  about, 
here  and  there,  to  and  fro.  He  never  worked  except  to 
hunt;  the  Haburas  eat  lizards,  cats,  mice,  tortoises, 
foxes,  and  jackals.  He  was  taught  religion  by  his  par- 
ents. H  he  never  ate  rabbit,  they  told  him,  he  would  go 
to  a  happy  place  when  he  died.     That  is  the  only  com- 


324  OTHER  SHEEP 

mandment  he  was  ever  taught  —  Thou  shalt  not  eat  rab- 
bit. It  was  for  him  all  the  law  and  the  prophets,  and 
as  he  had  a  wholesome  fear  of  devils  he  was  careful  to 
keep  it.  The  rabbit  appears  to  occupy  in  the  supersti- 
tions of  the  Haburas  the  place  more  amply  filled  by  the 
cow  in  those  of  the  Hindus.  As  for  stealing  and  mur- 
der, these  things  were  not  considered  wrong.  All  the 
Haburas  go  in  for  dacoity,  housebreaking  and  murder. 

He  told  us  that  he  is  perfectly  sure  devils  exist  and 
that  they  haunt  the  world  and  afflict  humanity.  On  one 
occasion,  he  told  us,  as  a  party  of  which  he  was  a  mem- 
ber were  returning  at  night  from  the  jungle,  a  female 
devil  suddenly  rose  from  the  earth  and  caught  hold  of 
him  by  the  arm;  he  shook  her  off  and  hastened  after  the 
others,  who  had  taken  to  their  heels.  Next  day  one  of 
the  party  went  blind  and  never  saw  again. 

I  asked  if  the  Haburas  pray  to  the  devils.  He  told 
us  that  they  pray  regularly  to  the  evil  spirits  and  offer 
sacrifices  to  them,  convinced  that  all  the  trouble  and 
sickness  and  harassing  which  afflict  them  proceed  from 
the  devils.  He  said  the  Haburas  are  terribly  afraid  to 
die  because  of  the  demons.  The  demons  are  so  bad 
now;  what  will  they  be  in  the  next  world  and  after 
death?  Terrible,  terrible!  He  shook  his  old  head, 
heaved  a  sigh,  and  moisture  welled  up  into  his  almost 
sightless  eyes.  The  young  Salvationist  laid  a  hand  on 
his  arm,  said  something  to  him  which  was  evidently  in- 
tended for  encouragement,  and  we  passed  on.  I  looked 
back  and  saw  that  the  poor  old  being  was  still  shaking 
his  head. 

We  came  upon  a  group  of  more  vigorous  and  cheer- 
ful men,  who  grinned  self-consciously  and  behaved  like 


THE  HABURAS  AND  A  CHOKIDAH 


3^S 


nervous  children  when  we  stopped  to  speak  to  them.  I 
asked  if  they  could  show  me  one  of  the  lizards  they  eat. 
A  man  went  off,  dived  into  a  hovel,  and  returned  with  a 
big,  fat,  dust-coloured  lizard  which  he  dropped  at  my 
feet.  I  was  surprised  to  see  that  this  creature,  still 
living,  made  no  effort  to  escape;  it  remained  prone  on 
the  ground,  its  tongue  shooting  from  its  thin  lips,  its 
bead-like  eyes  blinking  in  the  light.  "  They  cook  it 
alive,"  said  the  Indian  Salvationist ;  "  they  make  a  fire, 
throw  the  lizard  in,  and  when  it  is  baked  they  remove 
the  skin,  which  easily  comes  off,  and  eat  the  flesh." 
"  But,"  I  said,  "  does  it  make  no  effort  to  escape?  " 
"  Oh,  no,"  he  replied ;  "  you  see,  they  break  the  back- 
bone directly  they  catch  the  creature."  He  stooped  and 
lifted  the  lizard  from  the  ground.  "  This  one  has  its 
back  broken." 

One  was  shocked,  of  course,  inexpressibly  shocked,  but 
— "  they  know  not  what  they  do."  For  to  these  men, 
from  the  first  hour  of  consciousness,  life  is  a  hideous 
torture  and  a  frightful  wretchedness.  Haunted  by  dev- 
ils, oppressed  by  their  priests,  harried  and  driven  by  po- 
lice, they  inhabit  a  universe  which  is  full  of  oppugnance, 
hostility,  and  cruelty;  they  are  wanderers  on  an  earth 
which  shows  them  no  kindness,  which  hides  even  its  mice 
and  lizards  from  them;  which  burns  up  their  bodies 
with  heat  and  buries  its  water  deep  under  the  ground 
where  they  cannot  reach  it  —  a  universe  without  love, 
without  happiness,  without  rest;  a  universe  which 
flashes  a  sword  in  their  face  whithersoever  they  turn 
and  stands  ever  ready  to  strike  them  from  behind  with 
the  dagger  of  their  own  necessities.  If  you  could  look 
into  the  faces  of  these  people  you  would  see  there  a 


326  OTHER  SHEEP 

bitterness,  a  hopelessness,  and  a  despair  such  as  would 
almost  terrify  your  well-being  and  make  you  afraid. 
They  are  like  men  who  have  been  stretched  on  the  rack, 
broken  on  the  wheel,  and  cast  into  the  wilderness  to  die. 
They  have  none  of  the  rounded  animalism  and  dough- 
like stolidity  of  the  Doms;  they  are  just  human,  just 
living,  just  conscious.  Nature  has  brought  them  to  that 
point  where  they  can  experience  suffering  and  exercise 
reflection,  and  then  has  abandoned  them. 

But  dreadful  as  they  are  and  unintentionally  brutal 
as  they  are,  these  men  respond  to  human  kindness. 
There  are  only  a  few  of  them  ever  likely  to  become  in- 
telligent w^eavers  and  carpenters,  but  they  may  in  time 
succeed  as  scientific  husbandmen  of  a  rather  primitive 
type ;  and  certainly  there  is  ample  evidence  to  show  that 
in  their  hearts  there  is  something  which  welcomes  kind- 
ness, is  grateful  for  kindness,  and  endeavours  to  express 
gratitude. 

The  Salvationist's  wife,  an  Indian,  who  lives  with  her 
husband  and  children  in  this  mud  enclosure  —  a  very 
pretty  and  cheerful  little  creature  —  told  me  that  she  is 
not  in  the  least  afraid  of  the  Haburas.  *'  At  first  I  was 
afraid;  there  was  a  great  fight  one  night;  and  I  thought 
they  would  kill  each  other;  but  my  husband  went  and 
spoke  to  them  and  they  were  quiet.  Some  of  the  men 
and  women  are  really  trying  to  be  good.  Some  of  them 
are  good.  I  like  them  very  much.  They  are  just  like 
children;  if  3^ou  treat  them  like  children  they  will  do 
what  you  ask  them  and  listen  to  you  when  you  try  to 
teach  them." 

It  is  only  quite  lately  that  the  Haburas  came  into  the 
hands  of  the  Salvation  Army,  and  experienced  for  the 


THE  HABURAS  AND  A  CHOKIDAH      327 

first  time  in  their  existence  the  influence  of  kindness. 
In  another  generation  or  two  they  will  be  a  fine  race  of 
useful  and  upright  people. 

I  pointed  to  the  gates  as  we  went  out,  and  asked  the 
Brigadier  whether  such  a  flimsy  protection  was  sufficient 
at  night. 

"  No,"  he  said,  with  a  smile,  "  but  there  we  have  all 
the  protection  we  need  " —  and  he  pointed  to  the  proud 
and  strutting  chokidah  whose  body  was  turned  that  the 
Haburas  might  be  quite  certain  that  he  really  did  carry 
the  Sahib's  coat  upon  his  arm. 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY 

It  is  a  foolish  calumny  to  exhibit  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment, as  some  men  now  do,  in  the  character  of  a  lolling 
epicure  or  a  bedizened  circus  master.  There  may  be, 
as  there  are  in  all  governments,  matters  for  criticism, 
but  I  think  there  is  no  government  in  the  world  more 
earnest  in  the  cause  of  progress  and  enlightenment  than 
the  Government  of  India,  no  government  in  the  world 
that  can  show  a  more  impressive  record  of  achievement, 
no  government  that  is  served  by  a  more  faithful,  indus- 
trious, and  human-hearted  Civil  Service.  It  is  enough 
for  the  critics  of  this  Government,  if  they  can  obtain 
one  or  two  narratives  of  English  rudeness  to  Indian  gen- 
tlemen, to  condemn  the  whole  Government;  and  the  vis- 
itations of  plague  and  famine  are  sufficient  for  them  to 
prove  that  the  Government  is  idle  and  iniquitous. 

What  is  the  real  truth?  From  men  of  such  command- 
ing genius  as  Sir  John  Hewett  down  to  the  humblest 
engineer  employed  by  the  State,  the  whole  Indian  Gov- 
ernment is  ceaselessly  employed  in  developing  the  re- 
sources of  the  country  and  promoting  the  prosperity  of 
democracy.  The  Government,  for  instance,  supplies 
"  more  than  a  third  of  the  total  irrigation  of  the  coun- 
try." 

Not  only  do  these  canals  increase  prosperity:  they 
create  it.     Two  of  the   Punjab  canals  literally  have 

328 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  329 

converted  desolate  uninhabited  plains  into  thriving 
countries.  Along  the  banks  of  the  Chenab  canal  now 
stretch  fields  and  villages  inhabited  by  a  million  people, 
where  twelve  years  ago  a  few  nomads  wandered  over 
a  desert  of  parched  earth  and  camel-thorn.  The 
State  irrigation  works  of  India  are,  of  their  kind,  the 
greatest  and  most  beneficent  triumphs  of  engineering 
that  the  world  has  seen.^ 

Sir  Louis  Dane  said  to  me  in  his  picturesque  way, 
"  We  are  adding  an  Egypt  a  year  to  the.  Empire  by  our 
canals,  but  England  takes  no  notice."  All  this  Social- 
istic work  is  nothing  to  the  Socialist  at  home.  Let  a 
young  tea  planter  object  in  his  railway  carriage  to  a 
Native  who  collects  at  bedtime  his  lice  in  a  box,  lest  he 
should  hurt  them  by  lying  on  them,  and  the  fact  that 
the  Indian  Government  has  bestowed  happiness  and 
prosperity  on  a  million  people  inhabiting  what  was  once 
a  desert  of  parched  earth,  is  but  a  flourish  of  jingoism 
to  the  outraged  propriety  of  our  universal  reformer. 

Perhaps  few  people  in  England  realize,  from  the  Tory 
who  violently  supports  it  to  the  Socialist  who  as  vio- 
lently defames  it,  how  far  the  Government  of  India 
has  gone  along  the  road  of  what  we  should  term  in 
England  the  wildest  and  most  godless  Socialism.  To 
begin  with  the  soil  of  India  is  national  property,  and 
the  land  tax  is  national  revenue.  Imagine  such  a  state 
of  things  in  England!  Again,  the  railways  of  India 
are  national  property,  and  the  State  lets  them  out  to 
Syndicates  and  largely  controls  their  management.     Im- 

1  Studies  of  Indian  Life  and  Sentiment,  by  Sir  Bamfylde  Fuller, 
p.  IQ5- 


330  OTHER  SHEEP 

agine  such  a  condition  of  things  in  England!  Again, 
the  national  revenue  of  India,  with  no  Navy  to  pay  for, 
is  devoted  in  enormous  sums  to  the  development  of  the 
country.  Imagine  such  a  thing  in  England !  Strange  is 
it  not  that  the  home  Conservative  defends  in  India  what 
he  would  die  to  oppose  in  England,  and  the  Socialist 
attacks  in  India  what  he  so  eloquently  demands  for  Eng- 
land! 

Let  the  reader  judge  between  the  poor  calumny  of 
these  extreme  Socialists  and  the  sober  words  of  Sir  John 
Hewett.  That  great  administrator,  in  addressing  an  In- 
dustrial Conference,  convened  by  himself,  to  increase  the 
prosperity  of  the  United  Provinces,  had  the  honesty 
and  courage  to  make  these  following  references  before 
an  audience  composed  chiefly  of  Indians:  — 

*'One  experienced  manager  of  a  cotton  mill  in  these 
provinces,  speaking  at  the  Industrial  Conference  at  Be- 
nares in  1905,  said :  — 

"  *  Go  where  you  will  and  search  where  you  may,  you 
will  find  everywhere  the  same  complaint,  and  that  is  the 
poor  quality  of  labour.  And  it  is  poor  because  the  la- 
bouring man  is  not  thrifty.  He  only  values  money  for 
whatever  it  can  give  him  at  the  moment.  He  does  not 
value  work  for  work's  sake.  To  him  it  is  unfortunately 
a  matter  of  complete  indifference  whether  his  work  is 
bad  or  good.  He  does  not  value  time,  because  his  prac- 
tice is  not  to  do  as  much  as  possible  in  a  given  time,  but 
as  little  as  possible/ 

"  One  of  the  leading  merchants  in  Calcutta  writes  to 
me  as  follows :  — 

"  *  Keep  in  mind,  however,  the  good  old  British  sys- 
tem of  apprenticeship  which  ensures  a  boy  mastering  his 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  331 

craft  and  generally  loving  it  too.  The  Indian  people 
don't  go  to  work  in  the  mills  for  the  love  of  the  thing, 
but  to  make  a  living.  I  have  spent  thirty-three  years 
inside  mills  here,  but  not  one  Indian  has  suggested  an 
improvement  in  machinery  or  treatment  of  raw  ma- 
terial. Such  a  state  of  things  would  be  impossible  in 
Britain.  The  workman  there  is  very  low  down  in  the 
scale  who  does  not  plan  and  think  out  schemes  to  make 
his  tools  more  effective.' 

"  Mr.  Chatter jee  has  noticed  the  low  intellectual 
standard  of  the  handloom  weavers,  and  advocates  *  a 
very  wide  extension  of  primary  education  among  the 
weaving  classes.' " 

And  he  proceeded  as  follows :  — 

"  Gentlemen,  when  I  began  my  address  I  said  that  the 
problem  before  us  was  no  light  one.  It  is  equally  cer- 
tain that  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  this  country 
that  every  effort  should  be  made  to  solve  it  without  de- 
lay. Jn  no  country  that  I  know  of  have  the  conditions 
now  existing  in  India  ever  presented  themselves  before. 
We  have  a  large  and  expanding  railway  system;  we 
have  four  or  five  great  centres  of  industry  which  would 
compare  favourably  with  many  of  the  industrial  centres 
of  Europe;  we  have  the  richest  possible  collection  of 
mineral  and  vegetable  products ;  we  have  a  foreign  trade 
of  nearly  212  millions  sterling,  much  of  which  consists 
in  the  export  of  our  valuable  raw  products  in  return  for 
manufactured  articles  made  in  the  United  Kingdom 
and  foreign  countries.  In  certain  of  our  ports  you 
might  imagine  yourself  in  one  of  the  bustling  cities  of 
Europe.  Take  a  few  miles'  journey  into  the  interior  of 
the  country,  and  you  will  see  hardly  any  signs  of  indus- 


2,Z2  OTHER  SHEEP 

trial  enterprise,  and  will  at  once  recognize  that  you  are 
in  a  country  the  inhabitants  of  which  are  far  too  much 
dependent  on  a  single  industry,  viz.,  agriculture.  For 
such  a  condition  of  things  we  can  find  no  precedent,  and 
it  is  vain  to  look  for  precedent  in  our  efforts  to  remedy 
it.  Two  problems  set  themselves  palpably  before  us. 
First,  we  must  educate  people  so  as  to  divert  their  en- 
ergies to  industrial  pursuits  other  than  agricultural.  We 
must  educate  skilled  labour  for  all  our  industries.  We 
must  develop  among  our  workmen  an  interest  in  their 
work  to  replace  the  feeling  that  the  day's  work  is  only 
done  for  the  day's  wage;  and  we  must  bring  up  edu- 
cated foremen,  supervisors,  and  managers.  We  must  en- 
courage research  into  the  potential  value  of  our  raw 
produce.  Secondly,  we  must  endeavour  to  overcome  the 
shyness  of  capital,  and  success  in  this  respect  cannot  be 
achieved  unless  the  leaders  of  the  people  throw  them- 
selves enthusiastically  into  the  work. 

"We  have  now  to  consider  on  the  facts  that  will  be 
laid  before  us  what  principles  we  can  and  should  adopt. 
I  have  no  fear  that  you  will  shrink  from  your  responsi- 
bilities as  the  most  representative  body  hitherto  assem- 
bled in  India  to  grapple  with  these  weighty  problems. 
I  have  no  fear  that  you  will  be  timid  in  experiment  or 
fearful  of  risk  where  novel  conditions  must  be  dealt 
with,  or  shackled  by  precedent  where  no  true  precedent 
exists.  I  have  no  fear  that  you  will  accept  past  failure 
without  investigating  its  causes  to  see  if  they  cannot  be 
removed.  For  my  part  I  consider  that  the  object  to 
be  gained  is  worth  a  heavy  sacrifice.  I  confess  that  my 
imagination  is  powerfully  affected  by  the  opportunities 
of  the  present  occasion.     We  cannot  regulate  the  sun- 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  333 

shine  and  the  shower,  the  seed  time  and  the  harvest; 
that  is  beyond  the  power  of  man.  But  we  can  control, 
to  some  extent,  the  disposal  of  the  products  of  the  earth, 
thereby  opening  new  avenues  to  employment  and  spread- 
ing greater  prosperity  over  the  land.  We  may  make 
some  mistakes;  we  may  spend  some  money  unprofitably ; 
but  I  am  confident  that  we  are  entering  to-day  on  labours 
which  will  not  be  in  vain." 

Do  not  these  remarks  convince  one  of  an  honest  de- 
termination and  even  an  enthusiastic  devotion,  in  the 
cause  of  Indian  prosperity?  Are  they  not  the  utter- 
ances of  a  practical  statesman  whose  supreme  objective 
is  the  progress  and  development  of  the  common  people? 

Such  is  the  spirit  which  animates  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment. Into  whatever  province  I  went  I  found  men  of 
great  ability  and  strong  earnestness,  spending  them- 
selves for  the  peoples  of  India,  giving  their  days  to  the 
labour  of  promoting  the  wealth  and  happiness  of  de- 
mocracy—  and  enthusiastic  about  it.  In  no  single 
province  did  I  hear  of  any  legislation  which  by  the  great- 
est stretch  of  imagination  could  be  designated  class  leg- 
islation; the  entire  energies  of  Government,  the  entire 
forces  of  a  brilliant  and  assiduous  Civil  Service,  are  de- 
voted to  the  uplifting  and  safeguarding  of  Indian  de- 
mocracy. 

I  do  not  strain  metaphor  when  I  liken  the  twelve 
hundred  Englishmen  at  the  head  of  the  Indian  Gov- 
ernment to  the  managers  of  a  commercial  enterprise 
whose  whole  object  and  purpose  in  existence  is  the  pros- 
perity of  their  undertaking.  Between  each  province 
there  is  a  jealousy,  a  trade  rivalry,  a  spirit  of  compet- 
ing enthusiasm.     It  is  the  strain  and  energy  of  these 


334  OTHER  SHEEP 

countrymen  of  ours  to  excel  each  other  in  the  great  ad- 
venture of  Indian  prosperity. 

Consider  for  a  moment  what  this  Government  has 
done.  First,  it  has  estabHshed  peace  throughout  the 
length  and  breadth  of  India,  a  peace  in  which  the 
humblest  outcast  can  walk  unafraid  and  the  most  in- 
dustrious pursue  his  calling  without  risk.  This  by  itself, 
considering  the  racial  conflicts  and  religious  animosities 
of  the  immense  continent,  is  an  achievement  of  the  first 
magnitude.  But  the  Government  has  not  been  content 
with  this  achievement.  It  has  lighted  the  torch  of  edu- 
cation, and  it  has  preached  the  gospel  of  humanity.  The 
widow  is  no  longer  allowed  to  immolate  herself  upon  the 
pyre  of  her  husband;  the  rich  man  is  no  longer  allowed 
to  rob  and  oppress  the  poor ;  the  devotees  are  no  longer 
allowed  to  fling  themselves  under  the  wheels  of  Jagan- 
nat ;  torture  has  ceased  as  a  legal  instrument,  and  human 
sacrifices  have  been  stamped  out.  Hospitals  have  been 
built  for  the  poor  whom  the  Brahman  priest  and  the 
caste  doctor  would  not  touch.  Colleges  have  been  set 
up  for  the  youth  who  desires  learning.  The  doors  of 
the  Civil  Service  have  been  opened  freely  to  Indians  of 
every  race  and  caste.  Smallpox  has  been  largely  brought 
under  control.  Famine  is  recognized  as  Government's 
concern.  And  the  revenue  of  the  State  has  been  de- 
voted wnth  lavish  hands  to  reclaiming  the  desert,  regen- 
erating humanity,  and  prospering  the  hand  of  Science. 
A  more  Socialistic  Government,  as  I  said  above,  is 
scarcely  to  be  found  in  the  whole  world.  If  it  is  not  a 
Government  of  the  people  for  the  people,  it  is  a  Govern- 
ment of  enlightened  European  democracy  working  for 
progress,    enlightenment,    and    truth    among    a    people 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  335 

dominated  and  degraded  and  enslaved  by  a  religious 
aristocracy.  It  is  a  Government  which  has  bestowed 
Freedom  on  those  who  were  slaves. 

Never  was  the  real  position  of  things  in  India  better 
stated  than  by  Mr.  Valentine  Chirol  in  the  "  Conclu- 
sion"  to  his  great  monograph  on  Indian  Unrest:  — 

We  do  not  rule  India,  as  is  sometimes  alleged,  by 
playing  off  one  race  or  one  creed  against  another  and 
by  accentuating  and  fostering  these  ancient  divisions, 
but  we  are  able  to  rule  because  our  rule  alone  prevents 
these  ancient  divisions  from  breaking  out  once  more 
into  open  and  sanguinary  strife.  British  rule  is  the 
form  of  government  that  divides  Indians  the  least. 
The  majority  of  intelligent  and  sober-minded  Indians 
who  have  a  stake  in  the  country  welcome  it  and  sup- 
port it  because  they  feel  it  to  be  the  only  safeguard 
against  the  clash  of  rival  races  and  creeds,  which 
would  ultimately  lead  to  the  oppressive  ascendency  of 
some  one  race  or  creed;  and  the  great  mass  of  the 
population  yield  to  it  an  inarticulate  and  instinctive 
acquiescence  because  it  gives  them  a  greater  measure 
of  security,  justice,  and  tranquillity  than  their  forbears 
ever  enjoyed. 
The  same  writer  in  summing  up  the  tributary  causes 

of  modern  unrest  — 

the  great  confused  movement  which  is  stirring  the 
stagnant  waters  of  Indian  life  — 

enumerates  — 

the  steady  impact  of  alien  ideas  on  an  ancient  and 
obsolescent  civilization;  the  more  or  less  imperfect 
assimilation  of  those  ideas  by  the  few ;  the  dread  and 


336  OTHER  SHEEP 

resentment  of  them  by  those  whose  traditional  as- 
cendency they  threaten;  the  disintegration  of  old  be- 
liefs, and  then  again  their  aggressive  revival;  the  care- 
less diffusion  of  an  artificial  system  of  education, 
based  none  too  firmly  on  mere  intellectualism,  and 
bereft  of  all  moral  or  religious  sanction;  the  applica- 
tion of  Western  theories  of  administration  and  of 
jurisprudence  to  a  social  formation  stratified  on  lines 
of  singular  rigidity;  the  play  of  modem  economic 
forces  upon  primitive  conditions  of  industry  and 
trade;  the  constant  and  unconscious  but  inevitable 
friction  between  subject  races  and  their  alien  rulers; 
the  reverberation  of  distant  wars  and  distant  racial 
conflicts;  the  exaltation  of  an  Oriental  people  in  the 
Far  East;  the  abasement  of  Asiatics  in  South  Africa 
—  all  these  and  many  other  conflicting  influences  cul- 
minating in  the  inchoate  revolt  of  a  small  but  very 
active  minority  which,  on  the  one  hand,  frequently 
disguises  under  an  appeal  to  the  example  and  sym- 
pathy of  Western  democracy  a  reversion  to  the  old 
tyranny  of  caste  and  to  the  worst  superstitions  of 
Hinduism,  and,  on  the  other  hand,  arms,  with  the 
murderous  methods  of  Western  Anarchism,  the 
fervour  of  Eastern  mysticism  compounded  in  varying 
proportions  of  philosophic  transcendentalism  and  de- 
generate sensuousness. 

I  have  the  highest  authority  for  saying  that  Indian 
unrest,  while  it  is  a  troublesome  matter,  is  not  suffi- 
ciently serious  to  cause  alarm.  It  is  impossible  that 
any  mutiny  could  dislodge  the  British  Raj,  and  the  re- 
sult of  a  sanguinary  revolution,  if  it  ever  came  to  that 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  337 

would  (I  am  told)  only  serve  to  make  us  better  friends. 
Without  artillery  the  mutineers  would  be  powerless 
against  our  trained  forces;  and  the  telegraph,  the  tele- 
phone, and  wireless  telegraphy  are  weapons  in  the 
hands  of  Government  not  only  to  guard  against  sur- 
prise but  to  attack  instantly  at  every  point  of  danger. 
Furthermore,  there  is  no  indication  that  the  revolution- 
ists dream  of  so  prodigious  a  folly  as  a  second  mutiny; 
all  the  evidence  points  to  the  likelihood  that  they  will 
even  abandon  murder  and  assassination  and  develop  some 
form  of  passive  resistance  or  universal  strike. 

The  best  way  to  prevent  any  such  catastrophe  is  the 
original  policy  of  the  Indian  Government,  a  policy  which 
is  now  receiving  the  support  of  all  cultured  and  sensible 
people,  namely,  a  policy  of  industrial  development.  And 
I  should  like  to  say  that  there  is  not  a  province  or  district 
in  India,  the  Government  of  which  does  not  gratefully 
acknowledge  the  great  assistance  it  has  received  in  this 
field  of  enterprise  from  the  Salvation  Army.  To  the 
Salvation  Army  belongs  the  credit  of  Land  Banks,  the 
revival  of  spinning  as  a  cottage  industry,^  the  growing 
of  the  most  suitable  mulberries  for  silkworms,  the  em- 
ployment of  Criminal  Tribes  in  agriculture,  the  extended 
use  of  cassava,  and  many  other  highly  important  develop- 
ments in  trade  and  industry. 

For  too  long  the  young  men  of  India  have  regarded 
Western  education  only  as  a  ladder  to  Civil  Service  em- 
ployment or  as  an  avenue  to  the  Bar.     Disappointed  of 

^  The  improved  handloom  invented  by  an  English  Salvationist  in 
India  has  won  gold  medals  and  first  prizes  at  innumerable  exhibi- 
tions, and  is  now  being  largely  adopted  by  the  Government  as  a 
means  for  saving  the  millions  of  hand  weavers  from  extinction. 


338  OTHER  SHEEP 

employment  after  years  of  admirable  thrift  and  most 
painful  study,  they  have  become  the  easy  and  embittered 
victims  of  the  seditionist  and  the  priest.  To  turn  their 
attention  from  the  learned  professions  to  the  active  field 
of  commercial  and  industrial  expansion,  to  give  them  the 
glow  of  enterprise  and  the  courage  of  initiative,  this  is 
the  policy  of  the  Indian  Government  and  already  it  is 
beginning  to  justify  itself. 

"  The  hour  of  political  reform,"  said  Madame  de 
Remusat,  "  is  also  that  of  educational  schemes."  India 
illustrates  the  truth  of  this  significant  saying,  and  the 
w^hole  future  of  the  continent  may  be  said  to  hang  on  the 
educational  schemes  which  are  now  fermenting  in  the 
minds  of  people  conscious  of  a  political  existence.  On 
this  subject,  beyond  venturing  to  express  the  opinion  that 
Government  should  raise  the  salaries  of  schoolmasters 
to  a  point  which  will  attract  the  first  and  noblest  minds 
in  the  country  —  perhaps  the  simplest  solution  of  the  Ed- 
ucational Question  in  England  as  well  as  in  India  —  I 
will  make  a  few  quotations  from  the  addresses  of  Sir 
George  Clarke,  Governor  of  Bombay,  to  show  my  read- 
ers in  what  spirit  the  Indian  Government  is  confronting 
perhaps  the  most  difficult  of  all  its  problems :  — 

"  In  words  which  ought  to  be  printed  in  letters  of  gold 
in  every  class  room  in  the  world,  Ruskin  has  defined 
what  should  be  the  aims  of  the  schoolmaster.  *  The  en- 
tire object  of  education,'  he  wrote,  '  is  to  make  people 
not  merely  do  the  right  things,  but  enjoy  the  right  things 
—  not  merely  industrious,  but  to  love  industry  —  not 
merely  learned,  but  to  love  learning  —  not  merely  pure, 
but  to  love  purity  —  not  merely  just,  but  to  hunger  and 
thirst  after  justice.*     Those  are  counsels  of  perfection 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  339 

enshrining  ideals  which  may  be  unattainable  except  in  in- 
dividual cases.  Yet  surely  Senates  of  Universities  and 
Governments,  which  have  grave  responsibilities  for  the 
education  of  the  people,  in  India  especially,  should  hold 
fast  to  such  ideals  which  supply  the  only  valid  tests  by 
which  their  educational  achievements  can  be  judged.  In 
so  far  as  education  in  India  produces  results  approxi- 
mating to  the  conditions  laid  down  by  Ruskin,  it  will  be  a 
life-giving  force,  purifying  and  invigorating  the  body 
politic.  ■  It  can  only  accomplish  these  results  if  the  true 
ends  are  ever  kept  in  view  by  those  who  direct  its  policy 
and  its  methods. 

"  Our  education  is  never  complete.  We  can  and  we 
ought  to  go  on  learning  to  our  life's  end,  and  at  best 
Collegiate  training  is  but  a  foundation  upon  which  we 
may  build  if  we  choose.  To  those  of  you  who  have  made 
no  plans  for  the  future,  I  suggest  consideration  of  the 
teacher's  profession.  It  is  poorly  paid  as  I  have  pointed 
out.  It  is  not  honoured  as  it  should  be  and  will  be  in 
time  to  come;  but  there  is  no  other  walk  of  life  in  which 
a  young  Indian  can  render  his  country  so  great  and  so 
lasting  a  service.  It  is  the  earnest  and  conscientious 
teacher  alone  who  can  train  the  minds  and  bodies  and 
help  to  form  the  characters  of  the  rising  generation. 
He  only  can  effectively  fight  the  good  fight  against  super- 
stition, ignorance  and  ruinous  customs.  The  noble  spirit 
of  self-renunciation  dwells  among  you,  and  in  the  ranks 
of  our  teachers  we  have  some  shining  examples  of  prac- 
tical devotion.  As  I  hope  I  have  explained,  we  need  many 
more  such  examples,  and  for  those  of  you  who  will  ac- 
cept self-sacrifice  and  forgo  material  advantage  fine  ca- 
reers are  open  —  careers  which  will  develop  what  is  best 


340  OTHER  SHEEP 

in  you  and  will  assuredly  bring  you  abiding  happiness. 
I  conclude  my  address  as  I  began  with  some  words  of 
Ruskin  in  which  we  may  all  find  help  and  inspiration: 
*  Let  every  dawn  of  morning  be  to  you  as  the  beginning 
of  life,  and  every  setting  sun  be  to  you  as  its  close;  then 
let  every  one  of  these  short  lives  leave  its  sure  record 
of  some  kindly  thing  done  for  others,  some  goodly 
strength  or  knowledge  gained  for  yourselves/  To  the 
young  men  and  women  who  to-day  end  their  period  of 
pupilage  and  stand  at  the  great  parting  of  the  ways  in 
their  lives  I  can  offer  no  truer  advice  than  these  noble 
words." 

From  these  brief  extracts  the  fair-minded  reader  will 
perceive  not  only  that  the  Educational  Question  in  India 
is  regarded  in  a  wise  and  statesmanlike  manner,  but  that 
the  spirit  which  informs  the  Indian  Government  is  one 
of  which  England  has  reason  to  be  proud.  There  is  in 
that  Government,  whatever  its  shortcomings,  a  note  of 
fatherliness,  a  strain  of  paternal  tenderness;  and  how- 
ever implacable  it  may  be  to  fomenters  of  disorder  and 
preachers  of  sedition,  it  acts  as  a  providence  to  the  law- 
abiding  millions  of  India,  and  seeks  their  welfare  while  it 
covers  their  weakness  with  the  shield  of  the  British  Navy. 

There  is  a  Lion  in  the  way,  but  this  Lion  is  not  so 
fierce  as  he  is  painted.  Let  any  man  turn  to  the  past 
history  of  India  and  compare  those  blood-stained  pages 
with  the  documents  of  the  past  fifty  years,  and  he  must 
come  to  the  conclusion,  if  he  is  a  just  judge,  that  the 
presence  of  the  British  Lion  in  India  has  been  a  mercy 
to  that  country  and  a  blessing  to  civilization. 

In  the  attitude  of  Government  towards  Education,  in 


THE  LION  IN  THE  WAY  341 

their  realization  that  moral  teaching  is  essential,  and  that 
the  schoolmaster  should  serve  commerce  as  well  as  lit- 
erature, one  perceives  tlie  great  hope  of  the  future.  And 
we  may  be  certain  that  just  as  the  Indians  free  themselves 
from  the  incivilities,  isolations,  and  social  barbarisms  of 
their  perishing  superstitions,  so  they  will  meet  in  the 
Englishmen  of  India  a  body  of  men  not  only  willing  to 
be  their  friends  but  ready  to  share  with  them  even  more 
than  at  the  present  moment  the  burden  of  Government. 


THE  NEW  BIRTH 

"  It  was  Christianity,"  says  Mr.  Bernard  Lucas,  "  which 
awoke  the  West  from  the  sleep  which  followed  the 
mighty  activity  of  the  Greek  mind,  and  set  her  feet  in 
the  path  of  true  progress.  It  is  Christianity  which  has 
stirred  India  from  her  still  longer  sleep,  and  it  will  be 
Christianity  which  will  ofifer  to  her  the  material  for  a 
spiritual  life  and  thought  which  will  bring  untold  bless- 
ing to  the  world."  Indirectly,  as  I  have  attempted  to 
show  all  through  this  book,  the  religion  of  Jesus  has 
exercised  a  vast  and  miraculous  influence  on  the  peoples 
of  India;  and  this  influence  would  unquestionably  have 
been  vaster,  more  miraculous,  and  direct,  if  Christianity 
had  been  presented  to  India  by  a  united  and  rejoicing 
Christendom  as  the  blessing  and  good-news  of  a  Heaven- 
Father. 

In  concluding  this  book  I  should  like  to  leave  in  the 
reader's  mind,  with  the  sentiment  of  hope,  the  stronger 
and  more  masculine  inspiration  of  an  earnest  purpose. 
India  can  be  won  for  progress,  because  it  can  be  won 
for  Christ;  and  it  can  be  won  for  Christ  swiftly  and 
victoriously  if  the  followers  of  Jesus  awaken  to  the  new- 
birth  of  Christianity  and  give  themselves  with  enthusi- 
asm to  this  moving  spirit  of  emerging  truth. 

What  is  this  new-birth  of  a  religion  whose  glory  is 
that  never  once  has  it  stood  still  but  always  has  marched 
abreast  of  the  conquering  human  mind?     In  a  single 

342 


THE  NEW  BIRTH  343 

word,  it  is  a  resurrection  from  sorrow  to  joy.  All  that 
the  strokes  of  science  have  inflicted  on  this  religion  is  to 
destroy  its  accretions;  the  religion  itself  rises  from  the 
ruin  of  those  accretions  with  its  first  beauty  undimin- 
ished and  its  first  incomparable  glory  heightened  and 
enhanced.  No  longer  do  men  regard  themselves  as  liv- 
ing under  the  frown  of  the  displeasure  of  the  Infinite; 
no  longer  do  they  feel  themselves  to  be  miserable  and 
guilty  wretches  crawling  through  the  hostilities  of  three- 
score years  and  ten  to  the  anguish  of  eternal  torment; 
no  longer  have  they  any  consciousness  of  the  Everlast- 
ing God  as  a  blundering  Creator.  Fear  towards  the 
Universe  has  died  out  of  the  European  mind.  They 
have  ceased  to  think  of  a  Devil  in  their  recognition  that 
the  first  parent  of  all  sickness,  sorrow,  misery,  and  evil 
is  human  Ignorance.  Every  man  who  has  dispelled  igno- 
rance by  the  light  of  Knowledge  they  recognize  as  a 
servant  of  truth  and  a  minister  of  God.  And  they  will 
never  again,  so  long  as  civilization  advances,  surrender 
their  reasons  and  their  souls  to  the  magician  and  the 
soothsayer. 

In  the  first  brightness  of  absolute  knowledge,  when 
the  Churches  trembled  and  the  atheist  made  his  boast, 
it  seemed  as  if  Jesus  had  fallen  from  the  glory  of  Sav- 
iour to  the  humbler  greatness  of  prophet  and  idealist. 
But  it  was  only  for  a  little  while.  The  human  heart, 
whose  emotions  are  ahead  of  all  knowledge,  the  human 
heart  created  by  God  and  restless  till  it  rests  in  Him, 
looked  back  across  the  seons  of  its  journey  under  the 
stars  to  see  what  light  from  heaven  had  streamed  upon 
the  pathway  of  antiquity,  what  voice  from  God  had 
sounded  through  the  confusion  of  times  past;  and  there 


344  OTHER  SHEEP 

was  none  greater  than  Jesus.  In  a  sublime  loveliness  of 
beauty,  He  met  the  searching  gaze  of  the  troubled,  back- 
ward-looking legions  of  humanity;  and  when  they  turned 
to  go  forward  again,  He  was  there  in  front  of  them  — 
the  true  Shepherd  and  the  Light  of  the  World. 

He  remains  not  only  the  one  Ideal  of  humanity,  but  the 
sole  Hope  of  immortal  life.  He  is  the  Way,  because 
our  divinest  instincts  proclaim  it  right  to  follow  Him: 
the  Truth,  because  in  Him  alone  can  the  nations  ad- 
vance with  safety:  the  Life,  because  by  Him  alone  can 
the  soul  be  born  again. 

It  is  quite  certain  that  men  will  come  to  Him  more  and 
more ;  indeed,  He  has  never  been  so  diligently  sought,  so 
passionately  desired,  as  in  these  present  days;  the  very 
controversy  which  still  rages  round  the  four  little  simple 
beautiful  documents  which  preserve  for  us  the  essential 
sweetness  of  His  Character,  is  but  a  witness  to  His  at- 
traction; nor  can  any  man  imagine  a  time  in  which  it 
will  be  for  the  world  as  if  He  had  never  existed.  But, 
there  is  one  immense  and  separating  difference  between 
the  present-day  quest  of  Jesus  and  the  quest  of  other 
times.  It  is  not  with  a  hunger  to  surrender  the  reason 
and  to  rest  in  the  bosom  of  authority  like  a  tired  and 
frightened  child,  that  the  world  now  seeks  the  Christ; 
it  seeks  Him  by  the  reason  and  for  the  reason,  swept  to- 
wards Him  it  is  true  by  the  purest  instincts  and  divinest 
emotions  of  the  heart,  but  determined  in  the  strength  of 
its  God-given  reason  to  find  the  absolute  Jesus,  not  a 
false  Christ,  not  a  Chimaera,  not  a  Legend. 

And  it  is  surely  the  business  of  those  to  whom  Christ 
is  a  blessing  and  a  power,  to  clear  away  from  before  the 
feet  of  those  who  seek  Him  all  the  obstacles  and  barri- 


THE  NEW  BIRTH  345 

cades  of  error  which  timorous  ignorance  and  jealous  su- 
perstition have  set  up  in  every  age  between  the  world  and 
its  Light,  and  which  still  persist  for  the  darkness  of  un- 
numbered souls. 

India,  as  I  hope  this  book  may  be  the  means  of  show- 
ing, brings  home  to  the  honest  mind  with  an  irresistible 
force,  the  knowledge  that  well-nigh  all  our  Christian 
ceremonial  and  ritual  is  the  vestigial  product  of  supersti- 
tion and  idolatry.  And  India  teaches  us  that  a  sacri- 
ficing priesthood  engirded  by  ceremonial  and  ritual  has 
always  been  the  instrument  of  pessimism,  terror,  and 
abasement.  Reflection  on  these  two  indisputable  facts 
must  force  the  mind  to  their  two  logical  and  illuminating 
conclusions,  conclusions  which,  the  more  they  penetrate 
the  human  conscience,  the  more  swiftly  will  they  hasten 
the  new-birth  of  Christianity.  We  must  conclude  that 
the  ceremonial  and  ritual  of  a  degraded  superstition  can- 
not be  the  true  method  of  a  spiritual  religion;  and  equally 
are  we  forced  to  the  conclusion  that  the  pessimism  of 
our  religion,  so  similar  to  the  pessimism  of  Hinduism, 
must  have  its  origin  in  the  tradition  and  authority  which 
have  so  closely  copied  the  methods  of  superstition. 

Out  of  these  conclusions  there  rises  the  new  Chris- 
tianity, the  "  evangelium,"  or  "  glad-tidings,"  of  Jesus. 
Always  there  has  been  this  Christianity  living  in  the 
hearts  of  men,  but  it  has  never  yet  become  a  world  re- 
ligion. The  morality  of  Jesus  has  saved  the  world  from 
death,  but  the  religion  of  Jesus  has  not  yet  fired  the  world 
with  joy.  Not  until  men  live  beautiful  and  fearless  lives 
in  the  sure  knowledge  that  God  is  a  Father,  will  the 
earth  ring  with  joy  and  the  soul  of  man  sing  with  bless- 
ing.    And  never  will  the  Fatherhood  of  God  come  home 


346  OTHER  SHEEP 

to  humanity  while  the  Athanasian  definitions,  the  quar- 
relling theologies,  and  the  trivial  superstitions  of  sym- 
bolism stand  between  the  souls  of  men  and  the  pro- 
nouncement of  Christ  — "  I  am  come  that  they  might 
have  life  and  that  they  might  have  it  more  abundantly. 
.  .  .  My  Joy  no  man  taketh  from  you.  .  .  . 
Whosoever  shall  do  the  will  of  God,  the  same  is  My 
brother,  and  My  sister,  and  mother.  .  .  .  Come 
unto  Me,  all  ye  that  are  weary  and  heavy-laden.  .  .  . 
I  am  the  Light  of  the  World.  .  .  .  When  he  was 
yet  a  great  way  off,  his  father  saw  him,  and  had  compas- 
sion.    .     .     .     Our  Father  Which  art  in  Heaven." 

It  is  the  work  of  the  Twentieth  Century  to  rescue  the 
glad-tidings  of  Jesus  from  the  ruins  of  the  gloom,  and 
menace,  and  pessimism  of  a  falling  ecclesiasticism.  We 
cannot  hope  for  an  immediate  millennium  or  even  antici- 
pate a  cessation  of  hostilities.  There  will  be  fierce  fight- 
ing, a  period  of  darkness  and  despair,  perhaps  a  moment 
of  relapse  into  paganism.  But  the  victory  will  come. 
Christ  will  conquer  because  there  is  no  other. 

And  I  cannot  imagine  a  more  hopeful  beginning  for 
this  great  conflict  than  that  which  India  appeals  to  us  to 
make  now;  a  beginning  which  all  those  who  really  rely 
upon  Christ,  and  not  upon  the  habits  or  traditions  of  a 
particular  Church,  should  be  most  willing  to  make  — 
the  deliverance  of  a  single  message. 

It  is  impossible  at  present  that  the  missionaries  should 
teach  either  a  uniformity  in  acts  of  worship  or  that  they 
should  agree  to  an  entire  absence  of  ceremonial ;  but  they 
would  be  only  the  soulless  parts  of  a  dead  machinery  if 
they  refused  to  consider  whether  they  cannot  agree  to 


THE  NEW  BIRTH  347 

present  to  India  a  single  message  of  the  essentials  of 
Christianity. 

The  Fatherhood  of  God,  the  necessity  for  a  cleansed 
heart,  the  certainty  of  rest  in  Christ,  the  surety  of  ever- 
lasting joy  and  felicity  for  the  pure  and  righteous  — 
these  simple  things  are  the  essentials  of  that  teaching 
which  is  now  broken  up  into  a  hundred  contradictory, 
contending,  and  competing  theses.  Is  it  not  possible  to 
agree  that  only  the  essentials,  the  indisputable  and  beauti- 
ful essentials  of  the  Master's  teaching,  should  be  pre- 
sented to  India,  that  all  which  lies  beyond  the  moral 
essentials  should  be  left  to  India  herself  to  discover  and 
evolve  ? 

At  least  let  the  Churches  decide  this  central  and  de- 
termining question  —  Is  the  religion  of  Jesus  only  an 
evolution  of  the  older  religion  of  Buddha,  the  religion  of 
sorrow,  resignation,  and  non-existence,  or  is  it  the  sole 
and  solitary  religion  of  joy,  action,  and  hunger  after 
God? 

Not  only  India  waits  for  that  answer,  but  the  whole 
world. 


NOTES 

Page  12 

The  success  of  the  Salvation  Army  in  India  must  not  be 
ascribed  only  to  the  genius  of  Fakir  Singh.  To  begin  with,  his 
marriage  to  a  daughter  of  General  Booth  carried  into  the 
mission  field  of  India  one  of  the  most  able  children  of  a  unique 
family,  and  the  influence  of  Emma  Booth  in  the  affairs  of  the 
Salvation  Army  in  India  is  felt  to  this  day.  The  success  of  the 
Army,  as  so  many  of  the  narratives  in  this  book  v^itness,  seems 
really  to  belong  to  the  sincerity  of  its  missionaries,  both  Euro- 
pean and  Indian.  When  Fakir  Singh  left  India  for  America 
the  work  proceeded  without  let  or  hindrance,  carried  forward 
by  the  earnestness  and  devotion  of  its  officers  and  converts. 
The  personality  of  General  Booth  has  also  been  a  vast  influence 
in  this  crusade.  His  visits  to  India  have  been  occasions  of 
extraordinary  enthusiasm.  It  is  also  his  plan  of  employing 
women  as  missionaries  which  has  had  such  an  awakening 
efifect  upon  the  peoples  of  India,  particularly  the  poorer  classes 
who  are  so  wonderfully  amenable  to  sympathy  and  gentleness. 
If  I  have  formed  a  correct  opinion,  the  secret  of  the  success  of 
the  Salvation  Army  in  India  is  the  same  in  America,  England, 
and  most  of  the  other  countries  where  it  has  organized  itself, 
to  wit,  tremendous  earnestness  carried  forward  on  a  tide  of 
sweeping  enthusiasm  inspired  by  unquestioning  faith  in  the 
Bible  and  unfailing  love  for  humanity.  And  one  must  not 
omit  from  our  count,  the  organizing  genius  of  Mr.  Bramwell 
Booth  who  from  the  International  Headquarters  of  the 
Salvation  Army  in  Queen  Victoria  Street,  directs  this  great 
tide  of  world-wide  enthusiasm  and  keeps  the  Army  ever  at  its 

work  of  redemption. 

*        *        *        * 

349 


350  OTHER  SHEEP 

Page  37 

The  following  account  from  the  book  of  Abbe  Dubois  men- 
tioned below,  will  give  the  reader  a  luminous  idea  of  the 
Hindu's  attitude  both  toward  women  and  sorrow : — 

The  happiest  death  for  a  woman  is  that  which  overtakes  her 
while  she  is  still  in  a  wedded  state.  Such  a  death  is  looked 
upon  as  the  reward  of  goodness  extending  back  for  many 
generations;  on  the  other  hand,  the  greatest  misfortune  that 
can  befall  a  wife  is  to  survive  her  husband. 

Should  the  husband  die  first,  as  soon  as  he  breathes  his  last 
the  widow  attires  herself  in  her  best  clothes  and  bedecks  herself 
with  all  her  jewels.  Then,  with  all  the  signs  of  the  deepest 
grief,  she  throws  herself  on  his  body,  embracing  it  and  uttering 
loud  cries.  She  holds  the  corpse  tightly  clasped  in  her  arms 
until  her  parents,  generally  silent  spectators  of  this  scene,  are 
satisfied  that  this  first  demonstration  of  grief  is  sufficient, 
when  they  restrain  her  from  these  sad  embraces.  She  yields 
to  their  efforts  with  great  reluctance,  and  with  repeated  pre- 
tences of  escaping  out  of  their  hands  and  rushing  once  again 
to  the  lifeless  remains  of  her  husband.  Then,  finding  her 
attempts  useless,  she  rolls  on  the  ground  like  one  possessed, 
strikes  her  breast  violently,  tears  out  her  hair,  and  manifests 
many  other  signs  of  the  deepest  despair.  Now,  are  these  noisy 
professions  of  grief  and  affliction  to  be  attributed  to  an  excess 
of  conjugal  affection,  to  real  sorrow?  The  answer  will  appear 
rather  perplexing,  when  we  remark  that  it  is  the  general 
custom  to  act  in  this  manner,  and  that  all  these  demonstrations 
are  previously  arranged  as  a  part  of  the  ceremonies  of 
mourning. 

After  the  first  outbursts  of  grief,  she  rises,  and,  assuming  a 
more  composed  look,  approaches  her  husband's  body.  Then 
in  one  continuous  strain,  which  would  hardly  be  possible  under 
real  affliction,  she  apostrophizes  her  husband  in  a  long  series 
of  questions,  of  which  I  give  a  summary  below:  — 

"Why  hast  thou  forsaken  me?  What  wrong  have  I  done 
thee  that  thou  shouldst  thus  leave  me  in  the  prime  of  my  life? 
Had  I  not  for  thee  all  the  fondness  of  a  faithful  wife  ?    Have  I 


THE  NEW  BIRTH  351 

not  always  been  virtuous  and  pure?  Have  I  not  borne  thee 
handsome  children?  Who  will  bring  them  up?  Who  will  take 
care  of  them  hereafter  ?  Was  I  not  diligent  in  all  the  duties  of 
a  household?  Did  I  not  sweep  the  house  every  day,  and  did 
I  not  make  the  floor  smooth  and  clean?  Did  I  not  ornament 
the  floor  with  white  tracery?  Did  I  not  cook  good  food  for 
thee?  Didst  thou  find  grit  in  the  rice  I  prepared  for  thee? 
Did  I  not  serve  up  to  thee  food  such  as  thou  lovedst,  well 
seasoned  with  garlic,  mustard,  pepper,  cinnamon,  and  other 
spices?  Did  I  not  forestall  thee  in  all  thy  wants  and  wishes? 
What  didst  thou  lack  while  I  was  with  thee?  Who  will  take 
care  of  me  hereafter  ?  " 

And  so  on.  At  the  end  of  each  sentence  uttered  in  a  plaintive 
chanting  tone,  she  pauses  to  give  free  vent  to  her  sobs  and 
shrieks,  which  are  also  uttered  in  a  kind  of  rhythm.  The 
women  that  stand  around  join  her  in  her  lamentations,  chant- 
ing in  chorus  with  her.  Afterwards,  she  addresses  the  gods, 
hurling  against  them  torrents  of  blasphemies  and  imprecations. 
She  accuses  them  openly  of  injustice  in  thus  depriving  her  of 
her  protector.  This  scene  lasts  till  her  eloquence  becomes 
exhausted,  or  her  lungs  are  wearied  out  and  she  is  no  longer 
capable  of  giving  utterance  to  her  lamentations.  She  then 
retires  to  rest  for  a  while,  and  to  prepare  some  new  phrases 
against  the  time  when  the  body  is  being  prepared  for  the 
funeral  pyre. 

The  more  vehement  the  expressions  of  a  woman's  grief,  the 
more  eloquent  and  demonstrative  her  phrases,  the  more 
apparently  genuine  her  contortions  on  such  occasions,  so  much 
the  more  is  she  esteemed  a  woman  of  intelligence  and  educa- 
tion. The  young  women  who  are  present  pay  the  most  minute 
attention  to  all  she  says  or  does;  and  if  they  observe  anything 
particularly  striking  in  her  flights  of  rhetoric,  in  her  attitudes, 
or  in  any  of  her  efforts  to  excite  the  attention  of  the  spectators, 
they  carefully  treasure  it  in  their  memory,  to  be  made  use  of 
should  a  similar  misfortune  ever  happen  to  themselves.  If  a 
wife  who  was  really  afflicted  by  the  death  of  her  husband  con- 
fined herself  to  shedding  real  tears  and  uttering  real  sobs,  she 
would  be  thoroughly  despised  and  considered  an  idiot.     The 


352  OTHER  SHEEP 

parents  of  a  young  widow  once  complained  to  me  of  her 
stupidity  as  follows :  "  So  foolish  is  she  that,  on  the  death  of 
her  husband,  she  did  not  utter  a  single  word;  she  did  nothing 
but  cry,  without  saying  anything." 

*        *        *        * 


Page  53 

"The  most  popular  of  the  divine  hierarchy  of  the  Hindus  — 
the  goddess  known  as  the  '  Great  Mother ' —  is  depicted  as  an 
ogress.  She  is  black  in  face:  her  eyes  are  fierce:  blood  drops 
from  crimson  mouth  and  protruding  tongue:  she  is  garlanded 
with  human  skulls.  .  .  .  The  cult  of  Siva  has  degenerated 
into  phallic-worship  in  one  direction  and  into  demon-worship  in 
the  other."  ..."  Kali  is  propitiated  by  bloody  sacrifices  of 
buffaloes  and  goats.  To  the  extremists  among  her  followers 
sexual  restraint  is  a  denial  of  authority.  In  her  name  prostitu- 
tion has  become  a  temple  service,  and  her  attributes  have 
corrupted  deplorably  the  instincts  of  youth." —  Studies  of  Indian 
Life  and  Sentiment,  by  Sir  Bamfylde  Fuller. 


Page  56 

The  reader  who  wishes  to  make  himself  acquainted  with  the 
barbarous  customs  which  have  flourished  under  Hinduism, 
from  superstitions  connected  with  animals  down  to  mutilations, 
tortures  and  human  sacrifices  (Meriah)  could  not  do  better  than 
consult  the  Ethnographic  Notes  in  Southern  India  of  Mr. 
Edgar  Thurston,  published  by  the  Madras  Government. 


Page  58 

Dr.  Barnett,  Professor  of  Sanskrit  at  University  College, 
London  —  a  discriminating  admirer  of  Eastern  literature,  de- 
scribes the  Brahmanic  priestcraft  as  "  perhaps  more  crassly  ma- 


NOTES  353 

terial  in  spirit  and  in  practice  than  any  other  in  the  records  of 
literature."  In  The  Heart  of  India,  page  25,  he  says  of  this 
priestcraft :  "  An  immensely  intricate  web  of  ritual  —  often  of 
the  most  gruesome  and  butcherly  kind  —  was  spun  around  the 
whole  of  Indian  life,  with  the  avowed  object  of  forcing  from 
the  powers  of  nature  the  gifts  of  worldly  welfare  which  were 
theirs  to  bestow;  and  the  ghostly  power  of  the  Brahman  be- 
came supreme  in  the  land." 

At  pages  19  and  20,  he  says,  "  In  Indian  metaphor,  the  gods 
are  the  milch-kine  of  the  faithful,  the  priests  their  milkers. 
Wealth  and  worldly  welfare  are  the  chief  objects  of  religion." 

The  same  author  quotes  (page  112)  some  Telugu  satires  on 
the  Brahmans :  *'  Will  the  application  of  white  ashes  do  away 
with  the  smell  of  a  wine-pot?  Will  a  cord  cast  over  your  neck 
make  you  twice-born?  What  are  you  better  for  smearing  your 
body  with  ashes?  Your  thoughts  should  be  set  on  God  alone; 
for  the  rest,  an  ass  can  wallow  in  dirt  as  well  as  you.  The 
books  that  are  called  Vedas  are  like  courtesans,  deluding  men, 
and  wholly  unfathomable:  .  .  ."  In  spite  of  this  contempt, 
in  spite  of  a  hundred  efforts  to  get  rid  of  this  insolently  tyran- 
nical and  obviously  superstitious  priestcraft,  Brahmanism  re- 
mains the  master  of  India. 


Page  152 

The  Abbe  Dubois  in  his  admirable  book,  Hindu  Manners, 
Customs,  and  Ceremonies,  tells  the  following  stories  of  two 
Indians  who  sought  to  become  holy  men  after  the  Hindu 
fashion :  — 

"  I  was  a  novice  for  four  months,"  said  one  of  them,  "  under 
a  Sannyasi  who  had  built  himself  a  hermitage  in  a  lonely  spot 
not  very  far  from  the  town  of  Bellapuram.  Following  his  in- 
structions, I  spent  the  greater  part  of  each  night  awake, 
occupied  in  keeping  my  mind  an  absolute  blank  and  thinking 
of  nothing.  I  made  superhuman  efforts  to  hold  my  breath  as 
long  as  possible,  and  only  breathed  when  I  was  on  the  point 
of  fainting.     This  suffocating  exercise  made  me  perspire  pro- 


354  OTHER  SHEEP 

fusely.  One  day,  at  high  noon,  I  thought  I  saw  a  bright 
moon,  which  seemed  to  move  and  sway  from  side  to  side. 
Another  time  I  imagined  myself  enveloped  in  darkness  at 
midday.  My  director,  the  Sannyasi,  who  had  warned  me  that 
while  going  through  this  course  of  penance  I  should  see 
marvels,  was  greatly  pleased  when  I  mentioned  these  visions 
to  him.  He  congratulated  me  on  the  progress  I  was  making, 
and  prescribed  fresh  exercises  which  were  even  more  severe 
than  the  first.  The  time  was  not  far  distant,  he  assured  me, 
when  I  should  experience  much  more  surprising  results  from 
my  penance.  At  last,  worn  out  by  these  foolish  and  fatiguing 
practices,  and  fearing  lest  my  brain  might  really  be  turned,  I 
left  the  Sannyasi  and  his  meditative  penances,  and  returned  to 
my  former  state  of  Hfe." 

The  other  man  said :  — 

"  The  Sannyasi  under  whose  direction  I  placed  myself  had 
built  his  hermitage  at  some  distance  from  the  fort  of  Namakal, 
in  a  desert  spot.  Amongst  other  exercises  which  he  lay  down 
for  me,  he  obliged  me  to  stare  at  the  sky  every  day  without 
blinking  my  eyes  or  changing  my  position.  This  prolonged 
effort  inflamed  my  eyes  terribly  and  often  gave  me  dreadful 
headaches.  Sometimes  I  thought  I  saw  sparks  of  fire  in  the 
air;  at  others  I  seemed  to  see  fiery  globes  and  other  meteors. 
My  teacher  was  much  pleased  with  the  success  of  my  efforts 
and  with  the  progress  I  was  making.  He  had  only  one  eye, 
and  I  knew  that  he  had  lost  the  other  in  following  out  this 
practice,  which  he  assured  me  was  indispensable  if  I  wished  to 
attain  to  perfect  spirituality.  But  at  last  I  could  bear  it  no 
longer,  and  fearing  that  I  might  lose  the  sight  of  both  eyes,  I 
bade  farewell  to  meditation  and  the  celestial  firmament.  I  also 
tried  another  kind  of  exercise  for  a  time.  My  master  told 
me  that  an  infallible  means  for  making  rapid  progress  towards 
spirituality  was  to  keep  all  the  apertures  of  my  body  completely 
closed,  so  that  none  of  the  five  pranams  (winds)  which  are  in 
it  could  escape.  To  do  this  I  had  to  place  a  thumb  in  each 
ear,  close  my  lips  with  the  fourth  and  little  fingers  of  each 
hand,  my  eyes  with  the  two  forefingers,  and  my  nostrils  with 
the  two  middle  fingers;  and  to  close  the  lower  orifice  I  had  to 


NOTES  355 

cross  my  legs  and  sit  very  tightly  on  one  of  my  heels.  While 
in  this  attitude  I  had  to  keep  one  nostril  tightly  shut,  and 
leaving  the  other  open  I  had  to  draw  in  a  long  deep  breath; 
then,  immediately  closing  that  nostril,  I  had  to  open  the  other 
and  thoroughly  exhale  the  air  I  had  first  inhaled.  It  was  of 
the  greatest  importance  that  the  inhalation  and  the  exhalation 
should  not  be  performed  through  the  same  nostril.  I  continued 
this  exercise  until  I  lost  consciousness  and  fainted  away." 


THE   END 


7Bmilll',»?.'S?iSi','  Seminary  Librari 


1    1012  01186  8496 


Date  Due 

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